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(Page 18) 


THE WATER-BABIES 


A Fairy-Tale for Land-Babies 


BY 

CHARLES KINGSLEY 


Slightly abridged, in words of one syllable, and edited by 
G. MERCER ADAM 


Illustrated by 
CARLL B. WILLIAMS 


THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY 
Chicago AKRON, OHIO new yoek 


5 '- 4c4oQ? 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

DEC 1 1905 

^cpyrirht Entry 

rlJec./f/fcj- 

CLASS a, XXCi No, 



Copyright, 1905, 
by 

THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY. 



MADE BY 

THE WERNER COMPANY 
AKRON, OHIO 


CON-TENTS 


CHAP-TER PAGE 

I Tom, the Chim-ney Sweep-er 9 

II Tom Be-comes a Wa-ter Ba-by 24 

III The Wa-ter Fair-ies and the Salm-on 34 

IV El-lie and Pro-fess-or Ptthmllnsprts .43 

V Mrs. Do-As-You-Wonld-Be-Done-By 52 

VI Mrs. Be-Done-By-As-You-Did 65 

VII The Oth-er End of No-where 78 

VIII The Wa-ter Ba-bies Un-der-stand 89 



IL-LUS-TRA-TIONS 


PAGE 


Down the tree he went like a cat Fron-tis-piece 

So Tom went to go down, as if he had been a jol-ly lit-tle black 

ape ‘21 

He was sit-ting on a wa-ter lil-y leaf 36 

He was a con-ceit-ed fel-low, the old lob-ster 48 

“ You are a ver-y cru-el wom-an,” he said 58 

Tom put his fin-ger in his mouth, and looked at her under his 

brows, for he was a-shamed of him-self 69 

And there he saw the last of the Gair-fowl, stand-ing up on the 

All-a-lone-stone, all a-lone 80 

There sat up-on a rock, the most grace-ful crea-ture that ev-er 
was seen 99 




EDITOR’S PORE- WORD. 


TO THE LIT-TLE PEO-PLE, WHO, IF THEY READ, WILL BE SURE 
TO LIKE KiNGS-LEY'S CHARM-ING STO-RY. 

The au-thor of “ The Wa-ter Ba-bies,” Charles Kings-ley, 
was an Eng-lish cler-gy-man, po-et, nov-el-ist, and nat-u-ral- 
ist. He was born in 1819 in Dev-on-shire, went to col-lege at 
Cam-bridge, where he took high hon-ors, and, la-ter on, be- 
came pro-fes-sor of mod-ern his-tory, can-on of Ches-ter and 
West-min-ster, and was for thir-ty-three years rec-tor of Ev- 
er-sley, Hamp-shire, where he died in 1875. 

A man of wide and va-ried in-for-ma-tion, and of a chiv- 
al-rous, knight-ly char-ac-ter, with fine de-scrip-tive pow-ers 
as a wri-ter, Kings-ley wrote on ma-ny pol-it-ic-al and oth-er 
top-ics, which won his sym-pa-thies as a Chris-tian so-cial-ist, 
such as “ Al-ton Locke 99 and “ Yeast,” be-sides verse, such 
as his “ An-drom-e-da,” “ The Saint; Trag-e-dy,” and ma-ny 
short dra-mat-ic lyr-ics. But it is as an his-tor-i-cal nov-el- 
ist, and as a wri-ter of clas-sics for the young, that he is most 
fav-or-a-bly known and will, no doubt, be best re-mem-bered. 
Here his knowl-edge of his-tory and gifts of in-sight, im-ag- 
i-na-tion and feel-ing best serve him, as is seen in his sto-ries, 
“ Hy-pa-ti-a,” a romance of E-gypt in the fifth cen-tu-ry; 
“ Her-e-ward the Wake “ Two Years A-go and his fine 
nov-el, “ West- ward Ho! 99 with its stir-ring pic-ture of Eng- 
lish ad-ven-ture in the days of Queen E-liz-a-beth. 

More en-ter-tain-ing, for the young at least, were, how-ev- 

7 


8 


Water-Babies 


er, his Greek fair-y tales, en-ti-tled “ The He-roes,” which 
deals with the Ar-go-nauts, Per-se-us, and Thes-e-us; his 
in-struc-tive book “ Glau-cus, or The Won-ders of the 
Shore ” and, best of all, his de-light-ful “ Wa-ter Ba-bies,” 
with its thought-ful par-a-ble, set-ting forth the life of sin 
un-der the char-ac-ter of the chim-ney sweep, and of sel-fish- 
ness and world-li-ness in the ear-ly car-eer of the wa-ter ba-by, 
and, fi-nal-ly, of the change which came to Tom when, un-der 
the prompt-ings of con-science and the in-fluence of grace, 
both he and his old task-mas-ter Grimes, de-cide to live a new 
life and o-pen their minds to re-li-gious im-pres-sions. Then 
were Tom’s eyes o-pened, and he saw Mrs. Be-done-by-as-you- 
did and Mrs. Do-as-you-would-be-done-by, as beau-ti-ful rath- 
er than as ug-ly fair-ies, the change com-ing to both through 
Di-vine grace. 

The mean-ing of all this the young read-ers will per-haps 
hard-ly as yet un-der-stand, though it may be fur-ther ex- 
plained to them by their eld-ers. Fail-ing to gath-er the full 
and beau-ti-ful mean-ing Kings-ley had in view in wri-ting 
the fair-y tale, much may be learned a-bout it in a book by 
Judge Hughes, au-thor of “ Tom Brown’s School Days,” as 
well as from an ar-ti-cle in the pages of “ The Kin-der-gar-ten 
Mag-a-zine ” for May, 1905, by a re-vered friend of the pres- 
ent writ-er, Prof. Wm. Clark, D. D., D. C. L., of Trin-i-ty 
U-ni-ver-si-ty, Tor-on-to, Can-a-da. 

The ed-i-tor has on-ly to add that, to make the sto-ry pure-ly 
one of de-light and in-ter-est to young read-ers, some parts of 
it have been a-bridged, as be-ing be-yond the com-pre-hen-sion 
of the youth-ful mind. He has fur-ther sim-pli-fied the sto-ry 
by break-ing the words into syl-la-bles. 


New York, Easter, 1905, 


G, M. A. 


CHAPTER I. 


TOM, THE CHIMNEY SWEEPER. 

Once up-on a time there was a lit-tle chim-ney sweep, and 
his name was Tom. That is a short name, and you have heard 
it be-fore, so you will not have much trou-ble in re-mem-ber- 
ing it. He lived in a great town in England, where there 
were plen-ty of chim-neys to sweep, and plen-ty of mon- 
ey for Tom to earn and his mas-ter to spend. He could not 
read nor write, and did not care to do ei-ther ; and he nev-er 
washed him-self, for there was no wa-ter up the court where 
he lived. He had nev-er been taught to say his pray-ers. He 
nev-er had heard of God, or of Christ, ex-cept in words which 
you nev-er have heard, and which it would have been well if 
he had nev-er heard. He cried half his time, and laughed 
the other half. He cried when he had to climb the dark flues, 
rub-bing his poor knees and el-bows raw; and when the soot 
got into his eyes, which it did ev-ery day in the week; and 
when his mas-ter beat him, which he did ev-ery day in the 
week; and when he had not enough to eat, which hap-pened 
ev-ery day in the week like-wise. And he laughed the oth-er 
half of the day, when he was tos-sing pen-nies with the oth-er 
boys, or play-ing leap-frog o-ver the posts, or bowl-ing stones 
at the hors-es’ legs as they trot-ted by, which last was fun when 
there was a wall at hand be-hind which to hide. 

As for chim-ney sweep-ing, and be-ing hun-gry, and be-ing 
beat-en, Tom took all that for the way of the world, like the 

9 


10 


Water-Babies 


rain and snow and thun-der, and stood man-ful-ly with his 
back to it till it was o-ver, as his old don-key did to a hail- 
storm, and then shook his ears and was as jol-ly as ev-er ; and 
thought of the fine times com-ing, when he would be a man, 
and a mas-ter sweep, and sit in the pub-lie-house with a quart 
of beer and a long pipe, and play cards, and keep a white bull- 
dog with one gray ear, and car-ry her pup-pies in his poc-ket, 
just like a man. And he would have ap-pren-ti-ces, one, two, 
three, if he could. How he would bul-ly them, and knock 
them a-bout, just as his mas-ter did to him ; and make them 
car-ry home the soot-sacks, while he rode be-fore them on his 
don-key, with a pipe in his mouth and a flow-er in his but-ton- 
hole, like a king at the head of his army. Yes, there were 
good times com-ing ; and when his mas-ter let him have a pull 
at the leav-ings of his beer, Tom was the jol-li-est boy in the 
whole town. 

One day a smart lit-tle groom rode into the court where Tom 
lived. Tom was just hid-ing be-hind a wall to heave half a 
brick at his horse’s legs, as is the cus-tom of that coun-try 
when they wel-come strang-ers ; but the groom saw him, and 
hal-loed to him to know where Mr. Grimes, the chim-ney- 
sweep, lived. Now, Mr. Grimes was Tom’s own mas-ter; and 
Tom was a good man of bus-iness, and al-ways civ-il to cus- 
tom-ers, so he put the half-brick down qui-et-ly be-hind the 
wall, and pro-ceed-ed to take or-ders. 

Mr. Grimes was to come up next mom-ing to Sir John 
Harth-o-ver’s, at the Place, for his old chim-ney-sweep was 
gone to pris-on, and the chim-neys want-ed sweep-ing. And 
so he rode a-way, not giv-ing Tom time to ask what the sweep 
had gone to pris-on for, which was a mat-ter of in-ter-est to 
Tom, as he had been in pris-on once or twice him-self. 

His mas-ter was so de-light-ed at his new cus-tom-er that 


For Land-Babies 


11 


he knocked Tom down out of hand, and drank more beer that 
night than he was wont to do. And, when he got up at four 
the next morn-ing, he knocked Tom down a-gain, in order to 
teach him (as young gen-tle-men used to be taught at pub-lic 
schools) that he must be an ex-tra good boy that day, as they 
were go-ing to a very great house, and might make a very 
good thing of it, if they could but give sat-is-fac-tion. 

And Tom thought so too, and, in-deed, would have done 
and be-haved his best, even with-out being knocked down. 
For of all places upon earth, Harth-o-ver Place (which he 
had nev-er seen) was the most won-der-ful; and of all men 
on earth, Sir John (whom he had seen, hav-ing been sent to 
jail by him twice) was the most aw-ful. 

Harth-o-ver Place was really a grand place, and so Tom 
and his mas-ter set out for it. Grimes rode the don-key in 
front, and Tom and the brush-es walked be-hind — out of the 
court, and up the street, past the closed win-dow-shut-ters, 
and the wink-ing wear-y po-lice-men, and the roofs all shin- 
ing gray in the gray dawn. 

They passed through the pit-men’s or mi-ners’ vill-age, all 
shut up and si-lent now, and through the turn-pike ; and then 
they were out in the real coun-try, and plod-ding a-long the 
black dus-ty road, be-tween black slag walls, with no sound but 
the groan-ing and thump-ing of the pit en-gine in the next 
field. But soon the road grew white, and the walls like- wise ; 
and at the wall’s foot grew long grass and gay flow-ers, all 
drenched with dew; and in-stead of the groan-ing of the pit 
en-gine, they heard the sky-lark say-ing his mat-ins 1 high up 
in the air, and the pit-bird war-bling in the sedg-es, as he had 
war-bled all night long. 

All else was si-lent. For old Mrs. Earth was still fast 

i Mat-ins: Morn-ing songs or pray-ers. 


12 


Water-Babies 


a-sleep; and, like many pret-tv people, she looked still pret- 
ti-er a-sleep than a-wake. The great elm-trees in the gold- 
green mead-ows were fast a-sleep above, and the cows fast 
a-sleep be-neath them ; nay, the few clouds which were a-bout 
were fast a-sleep like-wise, and so tired that they had lain 
down on the earth to rest, in long white flakes and bars, a-mong 
the stems of the elm-trees, and a-long the tops of the al-ders 
by the stream, wait-ing for the sun to bid them rise and go 
a-bout their day’s bus-iness in the clear blue o-ver-head. 

On they went; and Tom looked and looked, for he nev-er 
had been so far into the coun-try be-fore, and longed to get 
o-ver a gate and pick but-ter-cups, and look for birds’ nests 
in the hedge; but Mr. Grimes was a man of bus-iness, and 
would not have heard of that. 

Soon they came up with a poor I-rish-wom-an, trudg-ing 
a-long with a bun-dle at her back. She had a gray shawl over 
her head, and a crim-son mad-der pet-ti-coat ; so you may be 
sure she came from Gal-way. She had nei-ther shoes nor 
stock-ings, and limped a-long as if she were tired and foot- 
sore ; but she was a very tall, hand-some wom-an, with bright 
gray eyes, and heav-y black hair hang-ing about her cheeks. 
And she took Mr. Grimes’s fan-cy so much, that when he came 
a-long-side he called out to her, — 

“ This is a hard road for a neat, shape-ly foot like that. 
Will ye up, lass, and ride be-hind me? ” 

But per-haps she did not ad-mire Mr. Grimes’s look and 
voice, for she an-swered qui-et-ly, — 

“ No, thank you; I’d soon-er walk with your lit-tle lad 
here.” 

“ You may please your-self,” growled Grimes, and went 
on smok-ing. 

So she walked beside Tom, and talked to him, and asked 


For Land-Babies 


13 


him where he lived, and what he knew, and all about him-self , 
till Tom thought he had nev-er met such a pleas-ant spo-ken 
wom-an. And she asked him, at last, wheth-er he said his 
pray-ers, and seemed sad when he told her that he knew no 
pray-ers to say. 

Then he asked her where she lived, and she said far a-way 
by the sea. And Tom asked her a-bout the sea ; and she told 
him how it rolled and roared over the rocks in win-ter nights, 
and lay still in the bright sum-mer days for the chil-dren to 
bathe and play in it ; and many a sto-ry more, till Tom longed 
to go and see the sea, and bathe in it too. 

At last, at the bot-tom of a hill, they came to a spring, which 
flowed from a cave. And there Grimes stopped and looked ; 
and Tom looked too. Tom was won-der-ing wheth-er any- 
thing lived in that dark cave, and came out at night to fly 
in the mead-ows. But Grimes was not won-der-ing at all. 
With-out a word he got off his don-key, and clam-bered over 
the low road wall, and knelt down, and began dip-ping his 
ug-ly head into the spring — and very dir-ty he made it. 

Tom was pick-ing the flow-ers as fast as he could. The 
I-rish-wom-an helped him, and showed him how to tie them 
up ; and a very pret-ty nose-gay they had made be-tween them. 
But when he saw Grimes ac-tu-al-ly wash, he stopped, quite 
as-ton-ished ; and when Grimes had fin-ished, and began shak- 
ing his ears to dry them, he said, — 

“ Why, mas-ter, I nev-er saw you do that be-fore.” 

“ Nor will a-gain, most like-ly. ’Twasn’t for clean-li-ness 
I did it, but for cool-ness. I’d be a-shamed to want wash-ing 
every week or so, like any dir-ty col-lier lad.” 

“ I wish I might go and dip my head in,” said poor lit-tle 
Tom. “ It must be as good as put-ting it un-der the town 
pump; and there is no one here to drive a chap a-way.” 


14 


Water-Babies 


“ Thou come a-long,” said Grimes; u what dost want with 
wash-ing thy-self? Thou didst not drink half a gal-lon of 
beer last night, like me.” 

“ I don’t care for you,” said naugh-ty Tom, and ran down 
to the stream and be-gan wash-ing his face. 

Grimes was very sul-ky be-cause the wom-an pre-ferred 
Tom’s com-pan-y to his; so he dashed at him with hor-rid 
words, and tore him up from his knees, and be-gan beat-ing 
him. But Tom was used to that, and got his head safe be- 
tween Mr. Grimes’s legs and kicked his shins with all his 
might. 

“ Are you not a-shamed of your-self, Thomas Grimes'? ” 
cried the I-rish-wom-an o-ver the wall. 

Grimes looked up, star-tied at her know-ing his name ; but 
all he an-swered was, “ No, nor nev-er was yet; ” and went 
on beat-ing Tom. 

“ True for you. If you had been a-shamed of your-self, 
you would have gone over into Yen-dale long a-go.” 

“ What do you know a-bout Yen-dale? ” shout-ed Grimes; 
but he left off beat-ing Tom. 

“ I know a-bout Ven-dale, and a-bout you, too. I know, 
for in-stance, what hap-pened in Al-der-mire Copse, by night, 
two years a-go come Mar-tin-mas .” 1 

“ You do? ” shout-ed Grimes; and leav-ing Tom, he 
climbed up over the wall and faced the wom-an. Tom thought 
he was go-ing to strike her; but she looked him too full and 
fierce in the face for that. 

“ Yes; I was there,” said the I-rish-wom-an qui-et-ly. 

“ You are no I-rish-wom-an, by your speech,” said Grimes, 
af-ter ma-ny bad words. 


1 Mar-tin-mas: for-mer-ly an Eng-lish hol-i-day, the Feast of St. Mar- tin (11th 
of Nov-em-ber). 


For Land-Babies 


15 


“ Nev-er mind who I am. I saw what I saw; and if you 
strike that boy a-gain, I can tell what I know.” 

Grimes seemed quite cowed, and got on his don-key with- 
out an-oth-er word. 

“ Stop ! ” said the I-rish-wom-an. “ I have one more word 
for you both; for you will both see me a-gain be-fore all is 
over. Those that wish to be clean, clean they will be; and 
those that wish to be foul, foul they will be. Re-mem-ber ! ’ 9 

And she turned a-way, and through a gate in-to the mead- 
ow. Grimes stood still a mo-ment, like a man who had been 
stunned. Then he rushed af-ter her, shout-ing, “ You come 
back.” But when he got in-to the mead-ow, the wom-an was 
not there. 

Had she hid-den a-way? There w T as no place to hide in. 
But Grimes looked a-bout, and Tom al-so, for he was as puz- 
zled as Grimes him-self at her dis-ap-pear-ing so sud-den-ly ; 
but look where they would, she was not there. 

Grimes came back a-gain as si-lent as a post, for he was a 
lit-tle fright-ened; and get-ting on his don-key, filled a fresh 
pipe, and smoked a-way, leav-ing Tom in peace. 

And now they had gone three miles and more, and came to 
Sir John’s lodge-gates. 

Tom and his mas-ter did not go in through the great i-ron 
gates, as if they had been dukes or bish-ops, but round the 
back way, and a very long way round it was ; and into a lit-tle 
back door, where the ash-boy let them in, yawn-ing hor-ri-bly ; 
and then in a pas-sage the house-keep-er met them, in such a 
flow-ered chintz dress-ing-gown, that Tom mis-took her for 
my la-dy her-self ; and she gave Grimes sol-emn or-ders a-bout 
“ You will take care of this, and take care of that,” as if he 
was go-ing up the chim-neys, and not Tom. And Grimes lis- 
tened, and said ev-er-y now and then, un-der his voice, 


16 


Water-Babies 


“ You’ll mind that, you lit-tle beg-gar? ” and Tom did mind, 
all at least that he could. And then the house-keep-er turned 
them into a grand room, all cov-ered up in sheets of brown 
pa-per, and bade them be-gin, in a lof-ty and tre-men-dous 
voice; and so, after a whim-per or two and a kick from his 
mas-ter, into the grate Tom went and up the chim-ney, while 
a house-maid stayed in the room to watch the fur-ni-ture. 

How ma-ny chim-neys Tom swept I can-not say; but he 
swept so ma-ny that he got quite tired, and puz-zled too, for 
they were not like the town flues to which he was ac-cus-tomed, 
but such as you would find — if you would only get up them 
and look, which per-haps you would not like to do — in old 
coun-try hous-es, large and crook-ed chim-neys, which had 
been al-tered a-gain and a-gain, till they ran into one an- 
oth-er. So Tom fair-ly lost his way in them; not that he 
cared much for that, though he was in pitch dark-ness, for 
he was as much at home in a chim-ney as a mole is un-der- 
ground; but at last, com-ing down as he thought the right 
chim-ney, he came down the wrong one, and found him-self 
stand-ing on the hearth-rug in a room the like of which he 
had nev-er seen be-fore. 

Tom had nev-er been in gen-tle-f oiks’ rooms but when the 
car-pets were all up, and the cur-tains down, and the fur-ni- 
ture hud-dled to-geth-er under a cloth, and the pic-tures cov- 
ered with a-prons and dus-ters; and he had of-ten e-nough 
won-dered what the rooms were like when they were all read-y 
for the la-dies to sit in. And now he saw, and he thought 
the sight very pret-ty. 

The room was all dressed in white, — white win-dow-cur- 
tains, white bed-cur-tains, white fur-ni-ture, and white walls, 
with just a few lines of pink here and there. The car-pet was 
all over gay lit-tle flow-ers, and the walls were hung with 


For Land-Babies 


17 


pic-tures in gilt frames, which a-mused Tom very much. 
There were pic-tures of la-dies and gen-tle-men, and pic-tures 
of horses and dogs. The hors-es he liked ; but the dogs he did 
not care for much, for there were no bull-dogs a-mong them, 
not even a ter-ri-er. But the two pic-tures which took his 
fan-cy most were, one a man in long gar-ments, with lit-tle 
chil-dren and their moth-ers round him, who was lay-ing his 
hand upon the chil-dren ’s heads. That was a ver-y pret-ty 
pic-ture, Tom thought, to hang in a la-dy ’s room. For he 
could see that it was a la-dy’s room by the dress-es which lay 
a-bout. 

The next thing he saw, and that, too, puz-zled him, was a 
wash-ing-stand, with ew-ers and ba-sins, and soap and brush- 
es and tow-els, and a large bath full of clean wa-ter — “ what 
a heap of things all for wash-ing ! She must be a very dir-ty 
la-dy,” thought Tom, “ by my mas-ter’s rule, to want as much 
scrub-bing as all that. But she must be very cun-ning to put 
the dirt out of the way so well af-ter-wards, for I don’t see a 
speck a-bout the room, not even on the ver-y tow-els.” 

And then, look-ing to-ward the bed, he saw that dir-ty la-dy, 
and held his breath in as-ton-ish-ment. 

Un-der the snow-white cov-er-let, upon the snow-white pil- 
low, lay the most beau-ti-ful lit-tle girl that Tom had ev-er 
seen. Her cheeks were al-most as white as the pil-low, and 
her hair was like threads of gold spread all a-bout over the 
bed. She might have been as old as Tom, or may-be a year 
or two old-er; but Tom did not think of that. He thought 
on-ly of her del-i-cate skin and gold-en hair, and won-dered 
wheth-er she was a real live per-son, or one of the wax dolls 
he had seen in the shops. But when he saw her breathe, he 
made up his mind that she was a-live, and stood star-ing at 
her, as if she had been an an-gel out of heav-en. 


18 


Water-Babies 


No. She can-not be dir-ty. She nev-er could have been 
dir-ty, thought Tom to him-self. And then he thought, “ And 
are all peo-ple like that when they are washed? ” And he 
looked at his own wrist, and tried to rub the soot off, and 
won-dered wheth-er it ev-er would come off. “ Cer-tain-ly I 
should look much pret-ti-er then, if I grew at all like her.” 

And look-ing round, he sud-den-ly saw, stand-ing close to 
him, a lit-tle ug-ly, black, rag-ged fig-ure, with bleared eyes 
and grin-ning white teeth. He turned on it an-gri-ly. What 
did such a lit-tle black ape want in that sweet young la-dy’s 
room ? And be-hold, it was him-self, re-flect-ed in a great mir- 
ror the like of which Tom had nev-er seen be-fore. 

And Tom, for the first time in his life, found out that he 
was dir-ty; and burst into tears with shame and an-ger; and 
turned to sneak up the chim-ney a-gain and hide ; and up-set 
the fend-er and threw the fire-i-rons down, with a noise as of 
ten thou-sand tin ket-tles tied to ten thou-sand mad dogs’ 
tails. 

Up jumped the lit-tle white lady in her bed, and, see-ing 
Tom, screamed as shrill as any pea-cock. In rushed a stout 
old nurse from the next room, and see-ing Tom, made up her 
mind that he had come to rob, plun-der, des-troy, and burn ; 
and dashed at him, as he lay over the fend-er, so fast that she 
caught him by the jack-et. 

But she did not hold him. Tom had been in a po-lice-man ’s 
hands many a time, and out of them too, what is more; and 
he would have been a-shamed to face his friends for-ev-er if 
he had been stu-pid e-nough to be caught by an old wom-an ; 
so he doub-led un-der the good la-dy’s arm, a-cross the room, 
and out of the win-dow in a mo-ment. 

All un-der the win-dow spread a tree, with great leaves and 
sweet white flowers, al-most as big as his head. It was a mag- 


For Land-Babies 


19 


no-li-a, I sup-pose; but Tom knew noth-ing about that, and 
cared less ; for down the tree he went like a cat, and a-cross 
the gar-den lawn, and over the i-ron rail-ings, and up the 
park to- wards the wood, leav-ing the old nurse to scream mur- 
der and fire at the win-dow. 

Nev-er was there heard at Hall Place — not e-ven when the 
fox was killed in the con-serv-a-tory, a-mong a-cres of bro-ken 
glass and tons of smashed flow-er-pots — such a noise, row, 
hub-bub, and to-tal con-tempt of dig-ni-ty, re-pose, and or-der, 
as that day, when Grimes, the gar-den-er, the groom, the 
dai-ry-maid, Sir J ohn, the stew-ard, the plow-man, the 
keep-er, and the I-rish-wom-an, — all ran up the park, shout- 
ing “ Stop thief,’ ’ in the be-lief that Tom had at least a thou- 
sand pounds’ worth of jew-els in his emp-ty pock-ets ; and the 
very mag-pies and jays fol-lowed Tom up, screak-ing and 
scream-ing, as if he were a hunt-ed fox. 

Tom, of course, made for the woods. He had nev-er been 
in a wood in his life ; but he was sharp e-nough to know that 
he might hide in a bush, or swarm up a tree, and, al-to-geth-er, 
had more chance there than in the o-pen. If he had not known 
that, he would have been fool-ish-er than a mouse or a min- 
now. 

But when he got into the wood, he found it a very differ- 
ent sort of place from what he had fan-cied. He pushed into 
a thick cov-er of rho-do-den-drons, and found him-self at 
once caught in a trap. The boughs laid hold of his legs and 
arms, poked him in his face and his stom-ach, made him shut 
his eyes tight (though that was no great loss, for he could not 
see at best a yard before his nose) ; and when he got through 
the rho-do-den-drons, the has-sock-grass and sedges tum-bled 
him over, and cut his poor lit-tle fin-gers af-ter-wards most 
spite-f ul-ly ; the birches birched him as sound-lv as if he had 


20 


Water-Babies 


been a no-ble-man at Eton, and over the face too (which is 
not fair swish-ing, as all brave boys will a-gree) ; and the 
bram-bles tripped him, and tore his shins as if they had 
sharks’ teeth. 

“ I must get out of this,” thought Tom, “ or I shall stay 
here till some-body comes to help me — which is just what I 
don’t want.” 

But how to get out was the dif-fi-cult mat-ter. And in-deed 
I don’t think he would ever have got out at all, but have 
stayed there till the cock-rob-ins cov-ered him with leaves, if 
he had not sud-den-ly run his head a-gainst a wall. 

Now, run-ning your head a-gainst a wall is not pleas-ant, 
es-pe-cial-ly if it is a loose wall, with the stones all set on 
edge, and a sharp-cor-nered one hits you be-tween the eyes, 
and makes you see all man-ner of beau-ti-ful stars. The 
stars are very beau-ti-ful cer-tain-ly; but un-for-tu-nate-ly 
they go in the twen-ty-thou-sandth part of a split sec-ond, and 
the pain which comes after them does not. And so Tom hurt 
his head; but he was a brave boy, and did not mind that a 
pen-ny. He guessed that over the wall the cov-er would end ; 
and up it he went, and o-ver like a squir-rel. 

And there he was, out on the great grouse-moors, which 
the coun-try-f oik called Harth-o-ver Fell — heath-er and bog 
and rock, stretch-ing a-way and up, up to the very sky. 

Now, Tom was a cun-ning lit-tle fellow — as cun-ning as 
an old Exmoor stag. Why not? Though he was but ten 
years old, he had lived long-er than most stags, and had more 
wits to start with in-to the bar-gain. 

He knew as well as a stag that if he backed he might throw 
the hounds out. So the first thing he did when he was o-ver 
the wall was to make the neat-est dou-ble sharp to his right, 
and run a-long un-der the wall for near-ly half a mile. 


For Land-Babies 


21 


Where-by Sir John, and the keep-er, and the stew-ard, and 
the gar-den-er, and the plow-man, and the dairy-maid, and 
all the hue-and-cry to-geth-er, went on a-head half a mile in 
the very op-po-site di-rec-tion, and in-side the wall, leav-ing 
him a mile off on the out-side ; while Tom heard their shouts 
die a-way in the woods, and chuc-kled to him-self mer-ri-ly. 

At last he came to a dip in the land, and went to the bot-tom 
of it, and then he turned brave-ly a-way from the wall and up 
the moor; for he knew that he had put a hill be-tween him 
and his en-e-mies, and could go on without their see-ing him. 

But the I-rish-wom-an alone, of them all, had seen which 
way Tom went. She had kept a-head of ev-er-y one the whole 
time ; and yet she nei-ther walked nor ran. She went a-long 
quite smooth-ly and grace-ful-ly, while her feet twin-kled past 
each oth-er so fast that you could not see which was fore-most ; 
till ev-er-y one asked the oth-er who the strange wom-an was, 
and all a-greed, for want of any-thing bet-ter to say, that she 
must be in league with Tom. 

But when she came to the woods, they lost sight of her; 
and they could do no less. For she went qui-et-ly o-ver the 
wall after Tom, and fol-lowed him wher-ev-er he went, but 
Sir John and the oth-er s saw no more of her. 

And now he be-gan to get a lit-tle hun-gry, and ver-y thir- 
sty; for he had run a long way, and the sun had ris-en high 
in heav-en, and the rock was as hot as an oven. 

But he could see noth-ing to eat any- where, and still less to 
drink. 

Yet he went on and on, till his head spun round with the 
heat, and he thought he heard church-bells ring-ing a long 
way off. 

“ Ah! 99 he thought, “ where there is a church there will 
be hous-es and peo-ple ; and per-haps some one will give me 


22 


Water-Babies 


a bite and a sup. ’ ’ So he set off a-gain to look for the church ; 
for he was sure that he heard the bells quite plain. 

And in a min-ute more, when he looked round, he stopped 
a-gain, and said, “ Why, what a big place the world is! ” 

And so it was ; for from the top of the moun-tain he could 
see — what could he not see ? 

To his right rose moor after moor, hill after hill, till 
they fa-ded a- way, blue into blue sky. But be-tween him and 
those moors, and real-ly at his feet, lay some-thing, to which, 
as soon as Tom saw it, he de-ter-mined to go, for that was the 
place for him. 

A deep, deep green and rock-y val-ley, ver-y nar-row, and 
filled with wood ; but through the wood, hun-dreds of feet be- 
low him, he could see a clear stream glance. Oh, if he could 
but get down to that stream! Then, by the stream, he saw 
the roof of a lit-tle cot-tage, and a lit-tle gar-den set out in 
squares and beds. And there was a ti-ny lit-tle red thing 
mov-ing in the gar-den, no big-ger than a fly. As Tom looked 
down, he saw that it was a wom-an in a red pet-ti-coat. Ah ! 
per-haps she would give him some-thing to eat. And there 
were the church-bells ring-ing a-gain. Sure-ly there must 
be a vil-lage down there. Well, no-body would know him, or 
what had hap-pened at the Place. The news could not have 
got there yet, even if Sir John had set all the po-lice-men in 
the coun-ty af-ter him; and he could get down there in five 
min-utes. 

Tom was quite right about the hue-and-cry not hav-ing got 
thith-er; for he had come with-out know-ing it the best part 
of ten miles from Harth-o-ver; but he was wrong about get- 
ting down in five min-utes, for the cot-tage was more than a 
mile off, and a good thou-sand feet be-low. 

How-ev-er, down he went, like a brave lit-tle man as he 


For Land-Babies 


23 


was, though he was very foot-sore and tired and hun-gry and 
thirst-y; while the church-bells rang so loud, he be-gan to 
think that they must be in-side his own head, and the riv-er 
chimed and tin-kled far be-low. 

So Tom went down, and all the while he nev-er saw the 
I-rish-wom-an go-ing down be-hind him. 


CHAPTER II. 


TOM BECOMES A WATER-BABY. 

A mile off, and a thou-sand feet down. 

So Tom found it, though it seemed as if he could have 
chucked a peb-ble on to the back of the wom-an in the red pet- 
ti-coat who was weed-ing in the gar-den, or even a-cross the 
dale to the rocks be-yond. For the bot-tom of the val-ley 
was just one field broad, and on the oth-er side ran the stream ; 
and a-bove it, gray crag, gray down, gray stair, gray moor, 
walled up to heav-en. 

So Tom went to go down ; stock and stone, sedge and ledge, 
bush and rush, as if he had been born a jol-ly lit-tle black ape, 
with four hands in-stead of two. 

And all the while he nev-er saw the I-rish-wom-an com-ing 
down be-hind him. 

At last he got to the bot-tom. But, be-hold, it was not the 
bot-tom — as peo-ple u-su-al-ly find when they are com-ing 
down a moun-tain. For at the foot of the crag were heaps 
and heaps of fal-len lime-stone of every size, from that of 
your head to that of a stage-wag-on, with holes between them 
full of sweet heath-fern ; and be-f ore Tom got through them 
he was out in the bright sun-shine a-gain, and then he felt, 
once for all and sud-den-ly, as peo-ple gen-er-ally do, that he 
was b-e-a-t, beat. 

He lay down on the grass till the bee-ties ran over him, and 
the flies set-tied on his nose. I don’t know when he would 

24 


For Land-Babies 


25 


have got up a-gain, if the gnats and the mid-ges had not taken 
pity on him. But the gnats blew their trump-ets so loud in 
his ear, and the mid-ges nib-bled so at his hands and face 
wher-ev-er they could find a place free from soot, that at last 
he woke up, and stum-bled away, down o-ver a low wall and 
into a nar-row road, and up to the cot-tage door. 



SO TOM WENT TO GO DOWN, AS IF HE HAD BEEN BORN A JOL-LY LIT-TLE BLACK APE. 


He came slow-ly up to the o-pen door, which was all hung 
round with clem-a-tis and ro-ses, and then peeped in, half 
a-fraid. 

An d there sat by the emp-ty fire-place, which was filled with 
a pot of sweet herbs, the nic-est old wom-an that ever was 
seen, in her red pet-ti-coat, and short dim-i-ty bed-gown, a,nd 
clean white cap, with a black silk hand-ker-chief over it, tied 



26 


Water-Babies 


un-der her chin. At her feet sat the grand-fa-ther of all the 
cats ; and op-po-site her sat, on two ben-ches, twelve or four- 
teen neat, ro-sy, chub-by lit-tle chil-dren, learn-ing their Chris- 
cross-row ; 1 and gab-ble enough they made a-bout it. 

Such a pleas-ant cot-tage it was, with a shin-y, clean, stone 
floor, and cu-ri-ous old prints on the walls, and an old black 
oak side-board full of bright pew-ter and brass dish-es, and a 
cuck-oo clock in the cor-ner, which began shout-ing as soon 
as Tom appeared ; not that it was f right-ened at Tom, but that 
it was just eleven o’clock. 

All the chil-dren start-ed at Tom’s dir-ty, black fig-ure — 
the girls be-gan to cry, and the boys be-gan to laugh, and all 
pointed at him rude-ly e-nough; but Tom was too tired to 
care for that. 

6 6 What art thou, and what dost want ? ” cried the old dame. 
“ A chim-ney-sweep ! A-way with thee! I’ll have no sweeps 
here.” 

“ Wa-ter,” said poor lit-tle Tom, quite faint. 

“ Water? There’s plen-ty i’ the brook,” she said quite 
sharp-ly. 

“ But I can’t get there; I’m most starved with hun-ger 
and thirst.” And Tom sank down upon the* door-step and 
laid his head a-gainst the post. 

And the old dame looked at him through her spec-ta-cles 
one min-ute, and two, and three; and then she said, “ He’s 
sick; and a bairn’s a bairn, sweep or none.” 

“ Wa-ter,” said Tom. 

“ God for-give me!” and she put by her spec-ta-cles, and 
rose and came to Tom. “ Wa-ter ’s bad for thee; I’ll give 
thee milk.” And she tod-dled off into the next room, and 
brought a cup of milk and a bit of bread. 

iChris-cross-row: the alphabet arranged in the form of a Cross, as a charm. 


For Land-Babies 


27 


Tom drank the milk off at one draught, and then looked 
up re-vived. 

“ Where didst come from? ” asked the dame. 

“ Over Fell, there,” said Tom, and point-ed up in-to the 
sky. 

“ Over Harth-o-ver, and down Lew-thwaite Crag? Art 
sure thou art not ly-ing? ” 

“ Why should I? ” said Tom, and leaned his head a-gainst 
the post. 

“ And how got ye up there? ” 

c ‘ I came over from the Place ; ’ 9 and Tom was so tired and 
des-per-ate he had no heart or time to think of a story, so he 
told all the truth in a few words. 

“ Bless thy little heart! And thou hast not been steal-ing, 
then? 99 

“ No.” 

“ Bless thy lit-tle heart! and I’ll war-rant not. Why, 
God’s guid-ed the bairn, be-cause he was in-no-cent! A- way 
from the Place, and over Harth-o-ver Fell, and down Lew- 
thwaite Crag! Who ever heard the like, if God hadn’t led 
him? Why dost not eat thy bread? ” 

“ I can’t.” 

“ It’s good e-nough, for I made it my-self.” 

“ I can’t,” said Tom, and he laid his head on his knees, and 
then asked, — 

“ Is it Sun-day? ” 

“ No, then; why should it be? ” 

“ Be-cause I hear the church-bells ring-ing so.” 

6 4 Bless thy pret-ty heart! The bairn’s sick. Come wi’ 
me, and I’ll wrap thee up some-where. If thou wert a bit 
clean-er I ’d put thee in my own bed, for the Lord’s sake. But 
come a-long here.” 


28 


Water-Babies 


But when Tom tried to get up, he was so tired and gid-dy 
that she had to help him and lead him. 

She put him in an out-house upon soft sweet hay and an old 
rug, and bade him sleep off his walk, and she would come to 
him when school was o-ver, in an hour’s time. 

And so she went in a-gain, ex-pect-ing Tom to fall fast 
a-sleep at once. 

But Tom did not fall a-sleep. 

In-stead of it, he turned and tossed and kicked about in 
the strang-est way, and felt so hot all over that he longed to 
get into the riv-er and cool him-self ; and then he fell half 
a-sleep, and dreamt that he heard the lit-tle white lady cry- 
ing to him, “ Oh, you’re so dir-ty; go and be washed; ” and 
then that he heard the I-rish-wom-an say-ing, “ Those that 
wish to be clean,- clean they will be.” 

And all of a sud-den he found him-self, not in the out-house 
on the hay, but in the mid-dle of a mead-ow, o-ver the road, 
with the stream just before him, say-ing con-tin-u-ally, “ I 
must be clean, I must be clean.” He had got there on his 
own legs, be-tween sleep and a-wake, as chil-dren will oft-en 
get out of bed and go a-bout the room, when they are not quite 
well. But he was not a bit sur-prised, and went on to the 
bank of the brook and lay down on the grass, and looked into 
the clear, clear lime-stone wa-ter, with every peb-ble at the 
bot-tom bright and clean, while the lit-tle sil-ver trout dashed 
about in fright at the sight of his black face ; and he dipped 
his hand in and found it so cool, cool, cool; and he said, “ I 
will be a fish ; I will swim in the wa-ter ; I must be clean ; I 
must be clean.” 

“ Ah,” said Tom, “ I must be quick and wash my-self ; the 
bells are ring-ing quite loud now; and they will stop soon, 


For Land-Babies 


29 


and then the door will be shut, and I shall nev-er be able to 
get in at all.” 

And all the while he nev-er saw the I-rish-wom-an, not be- 
hind him this time, but be-fore. 

For just be-fore he came to the riv-er-side, she had stepped 
down into the cool, clear wa-ter ; and her shawl and her pet- 
ti-coat float-ed off her, and the green wa-ter-weeds float-ed 
round her sides, and the white wa-ter-lil-ies float-ed round her 
head, and the fair-ies of the stream came up from the bot-tom 
and bore her a- way and down upon their arms; for she was 
the Queen of them all, and per-haps of more be-sides. 

“ Where have you been? ” they asked her. 

“ I have been smooth-ing sick folks’ pil-lows, and whis-per- 
ing sweet dreams into their ears; o-pen-ing cot-tage case- 
ments to let out the sti-fling air; coax-ing lit-tle chil-dren 
a- way from gut-ters and foul pools where f e-ver breeds ; turn- 
ing wom-en from the gin-shop door, and stay-ing men’s hands 
as they were go-ing to strike their wives ; do-ing all I can to • 
help those who will not help them-selves — and lit-tle e-nough 
that is, and wear-y work for me. But I have brought you a 
new lit-tle broth-er, and watched him safe all the way here. ’ ’ 

Then all the fair-ies laughed for joy at the thought that 
they had a lit-tle broth-er com-ing. 

“ But mind, maid-ens, he must not see you, or know that 
you are here. He is but a sav-age now, and like the beasts 
which per-ish; and from the beasts which per-ish he must 
learn. So you must not play with him, or speak to him, or 
let him see you; but on-ly keep him from be-ing harmed.” 

Then the fair-ies were sad be-cause they could not play with 
their new broth-er, but they al-ways did what they were told. 

And their Queen float-ed a- way down the riv-er ; and whith- 
er she went, thith-er she came. But all this Tom, of course, 


30 


Water-Babies 


nev-er saw or heard; and per-haps if he had it would have 
made lit-tle dif-fer-ence in the story; for he was so hot and 
thirs-ty, and longed so to be clean for once, that he threw him- 
self as quick-ly as he could into the clear cool stream. 

And he had not been in it two min-utes before he fell fast 
a-sleep, into the qui-et-est, sun-ni-est, co-si-est sleep that ev-er 
he had in his life ; and he dreamt a-bout the green mead-ows 
by which he had walked that morn-ing, and the tall elm-trees, 
and the sleep-ing cows ; and aft-er that he dreamt of noth-ing 
at all. 

The rea-son of his fall-ing into such a de-light-ful sleep is 
very sim-ple; and yet hard-ly any one has found it out. It 
was mere-ly that the fair-ies took him. 

The kind old dame came back at twelve, when school w T as 
o-ver, to look at Tom; but there was no Tom there. She 
looked a-bout for his foot-prints ; but the ground was so hard 
that there was no track. 

So the old dame went in a-gain quite sul-ky, think-ing that 
lit-tle Tom had tricked her with a false sto-ry, and shammed 
ill, and then ran a-way a-gain. 

But she changed her mind the next day. For when Sir 
J ohn and the rest of them had run them-selves out of breath, 
and lost Tom, they went back a-gain, look-ing very fool-ish. 

And they looked more fool-ish still when Sir John heard 
more of the sto-ry from the nurse; and more fool-ish still, 
a-gain, when they heard the whole sto-ry from Miss Ellie, 
the lit-tle la-dy in white. All she had seen was a poor lit-tle 
black chim-ney-sweep, cry-ing and sob-bing, and go-ing to 
get up the chim-ney a-gain. Of course, she was much fright- 
ened, and no won-der. But that was all. The boy had ta-ken 
noth-ing in the room; by the mark of his lit-tle soot-y feet, 


For Land-Babies 


31 


they could see that he had nev-er been off the hearth-rug till 
the nurse caught hold of him. It was all a mis-take. 

And Tom ? 

Ah, now comes the most won-der-ful part of this won-der- 
ful sto-ry. Tom, when he woke, for of course he woke, — 
chil-dren al-ways wake aft-er they have slept ex-act-ly as long 
as is good for them, — found him-self swim-ming a-bout in the 
stream, be-ing a-bout four inch-es long, and hav-ing round 
his neck and un-der his ears a set of gills just like those 
of a young liz-ard, which he mis-took for a lace frill, till 
he pulled at them, found he hurt him-self, and made up his 
mind that they were part of him-self, and best left a-lone. 

In fact, the fair-ies had turned him into a wa-ter-ba-by. 

A wa-ter-ba-by? You nev-er heard of a wa-ter-ba-by. Per- 
haps not. That is the very rea-son why this sto-ry was writ- 
ten. There are a great ma-ny things in the world which you 
nev-er heard of ; and a great ma-ny more which no-body ever 
heard of ; and a great ma-ny things, too, which no-body, per- 
haps, will ever hear of. 

“ But there are no such things as wa-ter-ba-bies.” 

No wa-ter-ba-bies, in-deed? Why, wise men of old said 
that ev-ery-thing on earth had its dou-ble in the wa-ter; and 
you may see that that is, if not quite true, still quite as true 
as most oth-er no-tions which you are like-ly to hear for ma-ny 
a day. There are land-ba-bies — then, why not wa-ter-ba- 
bies? 

At all e-vents, so it hap-pened to Tom — he had be-come a 
wa-ter-ba-by. And there-fore the keep-er, and the groom, 
and Sir John made a great mis-take, and were ver-y un-happy 
(Sir John at least) with-out any rea-son, when they found 
a black thing in the wa-ter, and said it was Tom’s bod-y, and 
that he had been drowned. They were ut-ter-ly mis-tak-en. 


32 


Water-Babies 


Tom was quite a-live, and clean-er and mer-ri-er than he ev-er 
had been. The fair-ies had washed him, you see, in the 
swift riv-er, so well that not on-ly his dirt, but his whole husk 
and shell had been washed quite off him ; and the pret-ty lit- 
tle real Tom was washed out of the in-side of it, and swam 
away, as a cad-dis 1 does when its case of stones and silk is 
bored through, and a-way it goes on its back, pad-dling to 
the shore, there to split its skin, and fly away as a ca-per-er , 2 
on four fawn-col-ored wings, with long legs and horns. They 
are fool-ish fel-lows, the ca-per-ers, and fly into the can-dle 
at night if you leave the door o-pen. We will hope Tom will 
be wis-er, now he has got safe out of his soot-y old shell. 

But good Sir John did not un-der-stand all this; and he 
took it into his head that Tom was drowned. When they 
looked into the emp-ty pock-ets of his shell, and found no 
jew-els there, nor mon-ey, — noth-ing but three mar-bles, and 
a brass but-ton with a string to it, — then Sir John did some- 
thing as like cry-ing as ev-er he did in his life, and blamed 
him-self more bit-ter-ly than he need have done. So he cried, 
and the groom-boy cried, and the hunts-man cried, and the 
dame cried, and the lit-tle girl cried, and the dai-ry-maid 
cried, and the old nurse cried (for it was some-what her fault) , 
and my la-dy cried, for though peo-ple have wigs, that is no 
rea-son why they should not have hearts ; but the keep-er did 
not cry, though he had been so good-na-tured to Tom the 
morn-ing be-f ore ; for he was so dried up with run-ning after 
poach-ers, that you could no more get tears out of him than 
milk out of leath-er; and Grimes did not cry, for Sir John 
gave him ten pounds, and he drank it all in a week. 

i Caddis (or caddice) : a worm which, when it issues from its larva condition 
from its shell, becomes a winged insect somewhat like a butterfly. 

2 Gaperer: the caddis-fly es-caped from its case or shell. 


For Land-Babies 


33 


Sir John sent far and wide to find Tom’s fa-ther and moth- 
er ; but he might have looked till Dooms-day for them, for one 
was dead, and the other was in Aus-tra-lia. And the lit-tle 
girl would not play with her dolls for a whole week, and nev-er 
for-got poor lit-tle Tom. And soon my la-dy put a pret-ty 
lit-tle tomb-stone over Tom’s shell in the lit-tle church-yard 
in Yen-dale, where the old dales-men all sleep side by side 
be-tween the lime-stone crags. And the dame decked it with 
gar-lands every Sun-day, till she grew so old that she could 
not stir a-broad; then the lit-tle chil-dren decked it for her. 
And al-ways she sang an old, old song, as she sat spin-ning 
what she called her wed-ding-dress. The chil-dren could not 
un-der-stand it, but they liked it none the less for that ; for 
it was very sweet, and very sad; and that was e-nough for 
them. And these are the words of it : — 

When all the world is young , lad > 

And all the trees are green; 

And every goose a swan, lad, 

And every lass a queen; 

Then hey for boot and horse, lad, 

And round the world away; 

Young blood must have its course, lad, 

And every dog his day . 

When all the world is old, lad, 

And all the trees are brown; 

And all the sport is stale, lad, 

And all the wheels run down; 

Creep home, and take your place there, 

The spent and maimed among: 

God grant you find one face there, 

You loved when all was young . 


34 


Water-Babies 


Those are the words ; but they are on-ly the bod-y of it : the 
soul of the song was the dear old wom-an’s sweet face and 
sweet voice, and the sweet old air to which she sang ; and that, 
alas! one can-not put on pa-per. And at last she grew so 
stiff and lame, that the an-gels were forced to car-ry her ; and 
they helped her on with her wed-ding-dress, and car-ried her 
up over Harth-o-ver Pells, and a long way be-yond that too ; 
and there was a new school-mis-tress in Yen-dale. 

And all the while Tom was swim-ming a-bout in the riv-er, 
with a pret-ty lit-tle lace col-lar of gills a-bout his neck, as 
live-ly as a crick-et, and as clean as a fresh-run salm-on. 


CHAPTER III. 


THE WATER-FAIRIES AND THE SALMON. 

He pray-eth well who lov-eth well 
Both man and bird and beast. 

He pray-eth best who lov-eth best 
All things both great and small: 

For the dear God who lov-eth us , 

He made and lov-eth all. 

Coleridge. 

Tom was now quite am-phib-i-ous, 1 and, what was bet-ter 
still, be was clean. For the first time in his life, he felt how 
com-fort-a-ble it was to have noth-ing on him but him-self. 
But he only en- joyed it : he did not know it, or think about it ; 
just as you en-joy life and health, and yet never think a-bout 
being a-live and health-y; and may it be long be-fore you 
have to think a-bout it ! 

Tom was ver-y hap-py in the wa-ter. He had been sad-ly 
o-ver-worked in the land-world; and so now, to make up for 
that, he had noth-ing but hol-i-days in the wa-ter-world for a 
long, long time to come. He had noth-ing to do now but en- 
joy him-self, and look at all the pret-ty things which are to be 

i Amphibious: part fish and part beast, and so able to live both on land and in 
water. 


35 


36 


Water-Babies 


seen in the cool, clear wa-ter-world, where the sun is nev-er 
too hot, and the frost is nev-er too cold. 

And what did he live on? Wa-ter-cres-ses, per-haps; or 
per-haps wa-ter-gruel and wa-ter-milk ; too ma-ny land-ba- 
bies do like-wise. But we do not know what one-tenth of 
the wa-ter-things eat, so we are not an-swer-a-ble for the 
wa-ter-ba-bies. 

Now, you must know that all the things un-der the wa-ter 
talk ; on-ly not such a lan-guage as ours, but such as hors-es 
and dogs and cows and birds talk to each other ; and Tom soon 
learned to un-der-stand them and talk to them; so that he 
might have had very pleas-ant com-pan-y if he had on-ly 
been a good boy. But I am sor-ry to say, he was too like 
some oth-er lit-tle boys, ver-y fond of hunt-ing and tor-ment- 
ing crea-tures for mere sport. Some peo-ple say that boys 
can-not help it; that it is na-ture, and only a proof that we 
are all o-rig-i-nal-ly de-scend-ed from beasts of prey. But 
wheth-er it is na-ture or not, lit-tle boys can help it, and must 
help it. For if they have naugh-ty, low, mis-chiev-ous tricks 
in their nature, as mon-keys have, that is no rea-son why they 
should give way to those tricks like mon-keys, who know no 
bet-ter. And there-fore they must not tor-ment dumb crea- 
tures ; for if they do, a cer-tain old la-dy who is com-ing will 
sure-ly give them ex-act-ly what they de-serve. 

But Tom did not know that ; and he pecked the poor wa-ter- 
things about sad-ly, till they were all a-fraid of him, and got 
out of his way, or crept in-to their shells, so he had no one to 
speak to or play with. 

The wa-ter-fair-ies, of course, were very sor-ry to see him 
so un-hap-py, and longed to take him, and tell him how 
naugh-ty he was, and teach him to be good, and to play and 
romp with him too ; but they had been f or-bid-den to do that. 


For Land-Babies 


37 


Tom had to learn his les-son for him-self by sound and sharp 
ex-pe-ri-ence, as ma-ny an-oth-er fool-ish child has to do, 
though there may be many a kind heart yearn-ing o-ver them 
all the while, and long-ing to teach them what they can only 
teach them-selves. 

Tom now swam a-way. He was be-gin-ning to be a lit-tle 
a-shamed of him-self, and felt all the naugh-ti-er, as lit-tle 
boys do when they have done wrong and won’t say so. 



HE WAS SITTING ON A WA-TER LI-LY LEAF. 


One day Tom had a new ad-ven-ture. He was sit-ting on 
a wa-ter li-ly leaf, he and a friend he had met, a drag-on fly, 
watch-ing the gnats dance. 

Sud-den-ly, Tom heard the strang-est noise up the stream ; 
coo-ing and grunt-ing and whi-ning and squeak-ing, as if you 
had put into a bag two stock-doves, nine mice, three guin-ea- 


38 


Water-Babies 


pigs, and a blind pup-py, and left them there to set-tie them- 
selves and make mn-sic. 

Tom asked the drag-on fly what it could be ; but, of course, 
with his short sight, he could not e-ven see it. 

But to-ward e-ven-ing it grew sud-den-ly dark, and Tom 
looked up and saw a blan-ket of black clouds ly-ing right 
a-cross the val-ley above his head, rest-ing on the crags right 
and left. He felt not quite fright-ened, but very still; for 
ev-ery-thing was still. There was not a whis-per of wind nor 
a chirp of a bird to be heard ; and next a few great drops of 
rain fell plop into the water, and one hit Tom on the nose, and 
made him pop his head down quick-ly e-nough. 

And then the ot-ter came by with all her brood, twi-ning 
and sweep-ing a-long as fast as the eels them-selves ; and she 
spied Tom as she came by, and said, — 

“ Now is your time, eft, if you want to see the world. Come 
a-long, chil-dren, nev-er mind those nas-ty eels; we shall 
break-fast on salm-on to-mor-row. Down to the sea, down to 
the sea! ” 

Then came a flash bright-er than all the rest, and by the 
light of it — in the thou-sandth part of a sec-ond they were 
gone a-gain — but he had seen them, he was cer-tain of it — 
three beau-ti-ful lit-tle white girls, with their arms twined 
round each oth-er’s necks, float-ing down the tor-rent as they 
sang, “ Down to the sea, down to the sea! ” 

“ Oh, stay! Wait for me!” cried Tom; but they were 
gone ; yet he could hear their voic-es clear and sweet through 
the roar of thun-der and wa-ter and wind, sing-ing as they 
died a-way, “ Down to the sea! 99 
“ Down to the sea? 99 said Tom; “ ev-ery-thing is go-ing to 
the sea, and I will go too. Good-by, trout.” But the trout 
were so bus-y gob-bling worms that they nev-er turned to 


For Land-Babies 


39 


an-swer him; so that Tom was spared the pain of bid-ding 
them fare-well. 

And now, down the rush-ing stream, gnid-ed by the bright 
flash-es of the storm; past tall, birch-fringed rocks, which 
shone out one mo-ment as clear as day and the next were dark 
as night ; past dark hov-ers, under swirl-ing banks, from which 
great trout rushed out on Tom, think-ing him to be good to 
eat, and turned back sulk-i-ly, for the fair-ies sent them home 
a-gain with a tre-men-dous scold-ing, for dar-ing to med-dle 
with a wa-ter-ba-by ; on through nar-row parts of the stream 
and roar-ing cat-ar-acts, where Tom was deaf-ened and blind- 
ed for a mo-ment by the rush-ing wa-ters ; a-long deep reach-es, 
, where the white wa-tei lil-ies tossed and flapped beneath the 
wind and hail; past sleep-ing vil-lages, under dark bridge 
arch-es, and a-way and a-way to the sea. And Tom could not 
stop, and did not care to stop : he would see the great world 
be-low and the salm-on and the break-ers and the wide, wide 
sea. 

And when the day-light came, Tom found him-self out in 
the salm-on riv-er. 

And af-ter a while he came to a place where the riv-er spread 
out into broad, still and shal-low lakes, so wide that lit-tle 
Tom, as he put his head out of the wa-ter could hard-ly see 
a-cross. 

And there he stopped. He got a lit-tle fright-ened. “ This 
must be the sea,” he thought. “ What a wide place it is ! If 
I go on in-to it I shall sure-ly lose my way, or some strange 
thing will bite me. I will stop here and look out for the ot-ter, 
or the eels, or some one to tell me where I shall go.” 

So he went back a lit-tle way, and crept into a crack of the 
rock, just where the riv-er o-pened out in-to the wide shal- 
lows, and watched for some one to tell him his way; but the 


40 


Water-Babies 


ot-ter and the eels were gone on miles and miles down the 
stream. 

There he wait-ed, and slept too, for he was quite tired with 
his night’s jour-ney ; and when he woke, the stream was clear- 
ing to a beau-ti-ful am-ber hue, though it was still very high. 
And af-ter a while he saw a sight which made him jump up ; 
for he knew in a mo-ment it was one of the things which he 
had come to look for. 

Such a fish! ten times as big as the big-gest trout, and a 
hun-dred times as big as Tom, scul-ling up the stream past 
him, as eas-i-ly as Tom had sculled down. 

Such a fish! shin-ing sil-ver from head to tail, and here 
and there a crim-son dot ; with a grand hooked nose, and grand 
curl-ing lip, and a grand bright eye, look-ing round him as 
proud-ly as a king, and sur-vey-ing the wa-ter right and left 
as if all be-longed to him. Sure-ly he must be the salm-on, 
the king of all the fish. 

Tom was so fright-ened that he longed to creep into a hole ; 
but he need not have been ; for salm-on are all true gen-tle- 
men, and, like true gen-tle-men, they look no-ble and proud 
e-nough, and yet, like true gen-tle-men, they nev-er harm or 
quar-rel with any one, but go a-bout their own bus-iness, and 
leave rude fel-lows to them-selves. 

The salm-on looked at him full in the face, and then went 
on with-out mind-ing him, with a swish or two of his tail 
which made the stream boil a-gain. And in a few min-utes 
came an-oth-er, and then four or five, and so on ; and all passed 
Tom, rush-ing and plung-ing up the cat-ar-act with strong 
strokes of their sil-ver tails, now and then leap-ing clean out 
of the wa-ter and up over a rock, shi-ning glor-i-ous-ly for a 
mo-ment in the bright sun ; while Tom was so de-light-ed that 
he could have watched them all day long. 


For Land-Babies 


41 


And at last one came np big-ger than all the rest; but he 
came slow-ly, and stopped, and looked back, and seemed very 
an-xious and bu-sy. And Tom saw that he was help-ing an- 
oth-er salm-on, an es-pe-cial-ly hand-some one, who had not a 
single spot upon it, but was clothed in pure sil-ver from nose 
to tail. 

“ My dear,” said the great fish to his com-pan-ion, “ you 
real-ly look dread-ful-ly tired, and you must not o-ver ex-ert 
your-self at first. Do rest your-self be-hind this rock,” and 
he shoved her gent-ly with his nose to the rock where Tom sat. 

You must know that this was the salm-on ’s wife. For 
salm-on, like other true gen-tle-men, always choose their la- 
dy, and love her, and are true to her, and take care of her, and 
work for her, and fight for her, as ev-er-y true gen-tle-man 
ought ; and are not like vul-gar chub and roach and pike, who 
have no high feel-ings, and take no care of their wives. 

Then he saw Tom, and looked at him ver-y fierce-ly one mo- 
ment, as if he were go-ing to bite him. 

“ What do you want here? ” he said ver-y fierce-ly. 

“ Oh, don’t hurt me! ” cried Tom. “ I only want to look 
at you; you are so hand-some.” 

“ Ah! ” said the salm-on, ver-y state-ly but ver-y civ-il-ly. 
“ I real-ly beg your par-don; I see what you are, my lit-tle 
dear. I have met one or two crea-tures like you be-fore, and 
found them very a-gree-a-ble and well-be-haved. In-deed, 
one of them showed me a great kind-ness late-ly, which I hope 
to be able to re-pay. I hope we shall not be in your way here. 
As soon as this la-dy is rest-ed, we shall pro-ceed on our jour- 
ney.” 

What a well-bred old salm-on he was ! 

“ So you have seen things like me be-fore? ” asked Tom. 

“ Sev-er-al times, my dear. In-deed, it was only last night 


42 


Water-Babies 


that one at the riv-er’s month came and warned me and my 
wife of some new stake-nets which had got into the stream, I 
can-not tell how, since last win-ter, and showed ns the way 
round them in the most charm-ing-ly o-hlig-ing way.” 

“ So there are ba-bies in the sea? ” cried Tom, and clapped 
his lit-tle hands. “ Then I shall have some one to play with 
there? How de-light-fnl ! ” 

“ Were there no ba-bies np this stream? ” asked the la-dy 
salm-on. 

“ No; and I grew so lone-ly. I thought I saw three last 
night ; but they were gone in an in-stant, down to the sea. So 
I went too ; for I had noth-ing to play with but the cad-dis-es 
and drag-on flies and trout.” 

“ Ugh! ” cried the lady, “ what low com-pa-ny! ” 

“ My dear, if he has been in low com-pa-ny, he has cer-tain- 
ly not learnt their low man-ners,” said the salm-on. 

“ No, in-deed, poor lit-tle dear; but how sad for him to live 
a-mong such peo-ple as cad-dis-es, who have ac-tu-al-ly six 
legs, the nas-ty things; and drag-on flies too! Why they 
are not even good to eat ; for I tried them once, and they are 
all hard and emp-ty ; and as for trout, ev-er-y one knows what 
they are.” At this she curled up her lip, and looked dread- 
ful-ly scorn-ful, while her hus-band curled up his too, till he 
looked as proud as a sol-dier. 

“ Why do you dis-like the trout so? ” asked Tom. 

“ My dear, we do not ev-en men-tion them, if we can help 
it ; for I am sor-ry to say they are re-la-tions of ours who do 
us no cred-it. A great ma-ny years a-go they were just like 
us ; but they were so la-zy and cow-ard-ly and greed-y, that 
in-stead of go-ing down to the sea ev-er-y year to see the world 
and grow strong and fat, they chose to stay and poke a-bout 
in the lit-tle streams and eat worms and grubs ; and they are 


For Land-Babies 


43 


very prop-er-ly pun-ished for it; for they have grown ug-ly 
and brown and spot-ted and small, and are ac-tu-al-ly so de- 
graded in their tastes that they will eat our chil-dren.” 

“ And then they pre-tend to scrape ac-quain-tance with us 
a-gain,” said the la-dy. “ Why, I have ac-tu-al-ly known 
one of them to pro-pose to a la-dy salm-on, the im-pu-dent lit- 
tle crea-ture.” 

“ I should hope,” said the gen-tle-man, “ that there are 
ver-y few la-dies of our race who would de-grade them-selves 
by lis-ten-ing to such a crea-ture for an in-stant. If I saw 
such a thing hap-pen, I should con-sid-er it my duty to put 
them both to death upon the spot.” So the salm-on said, and 
he would have done it too. For you must know, no en-e-mies 
are so bit-ter a-gainst each oth-er as those who are of the same 
race ; and a salm-on looks on a trout as some great folks look 
on some lit-tle folks, as some-thing just too much like him- 
self to be tol-er-a-ted. 


CHAPTER IV. 


ELLIE AND PROFESSOR PTTHMLLNSPRTS. 

So the salm-on went up, after Tom had warned them of the 
wick-ed old ot-ter ; and Tom went down, but slow-ly and cau- 
tious-ly, coast-ing a-long the shore. He was ma-ny days 
about it, for it was ma-ny miles down to the sea ; and per-haps 
he would nev-er have found his way, if the fair-ies had not 
guid-ed him, with-out his see-ing their fair fac-es, or feel-ing 
their gen-tle hands. 

Sud-den-ly, he saw a beau-ti-ful sight. A bright red light 
moved along the riv-er-side, and threw down into the wa-ter 
a long tap-root of flame. Tom, cu-ri-ous lit-tle rogue that he 
was, must needs go and see what it was; so he swam to the 
,shore, and met the light as it stopped over a shal-low run at 
the edge of a low rock. 

And there, un-der-neath the light, lay five or six great 
salm-on, look-ing up at the flame with their great gog-gle 
eyes, and wag-ging their tails, as if they were ver-y much 
pleased at it. 

Tom came to the top to look at this won-der-ful light near- 
er, and made a splash. 

And he heard a voice say, — 

“ There was a fish rose.” 

He did not know what the words meant, but he seemed to 
know the sound of them, and to know the voice which spoke 
them; and he saw on the bank three great two-legged crea- 
44 


For Land-Babies 


45 


tures, one of whom held the light, flar-ing and sput-ter-ing, 
and an-oth-er a long pole. And he knew that they were men, 
and was fright-ened, and crept into a hole in the rock, from 
which he could see what went on. 

The man with the torch bent down over the wa-ter and 
looked ear-nest-ly in ; and then he said, — 

“ Tak’ that muc-kle 1 f el-low, lad; he’s ower 2 fif-teen punds ; 3 
and haud 4 your hand stead-y.” 

Tom felt that there was some dan-ger com-ing, and longed 
to warn the f ool-ish salm-on, who kept star-ing up at the light 
as if he was be-witched. But be-fore he could make up his 
mind, down came the pole through the wa-ter; there was a 
fear-ful splash and strug-gle, and Torn saw that the poor 
salm-on was speared right through, and was lifted out of the 
wa-ter. 

And then, from be-hind, there sprang on these three men 
three other men ; and there were shouts and blows, and words 
which Tom rec-ol-lect-ed to have heard be-fore ; and he shud- 
dered and turned sick at them now, for he felt some-how that 
they were strange and ug-ly and wrong and hor-ri-ble. And 
it all be-gan to come back to him. They were men, and they 
were fight-ing; sav-age, des-per-ate, up-and-down fight-ing, 
such as Tom had seen too ma-ny times be-fore. 

And he stopped his lit-tle ears, and longed to swim a- way ; 
and was ver-y glad that he was a wa-ter-ba-by, and had noth- 
ing to do any more with hor-rid dir-ty men, with foul clothes 
on their backs, and foul words on their lips ; but he dared not 
stir out of his hole, while the rock shook over his head with 
the tramp-ling and strug-gling of the keep-ers 5 and the poach- 
ers . 6 

i muckle: big. 2 ower: over. sptmds: pounds. * haud: hold. 

s keepers: men who take care of the game and fish-preserves. 

8 poachers: those, contrary to law, who despoil them. 


46 


Water-Babies 


All of a sud-den there was a tre-men-dous splash, and a 
fright-ful flash, and a hiss-ing, and all was still. 

For into the wa-ter, close to Tom, fell one of the men — he 
who held the light in his hand. In-to the swift riv-er he sank, 
and rolled o-ver and o-ver in the cur-rent. Tom heard the 
men a-bove run a-long, seem-ing-ly look-ing for him; but he 
drift-ed down into the deep hole be-low, and there lay quite 
still, and they could not find him. 

Tom wait-ed a long time, till all was quiet, and then he 
peeped out and saw the man ly-ing. At last he screwed up 
his cour-age and swam down to him. “ Per-haps,” he 
thought, “ the wa-ter has made him fall a-sleep as it did me.” 

Then he went near-er. He grew more and more cu-ri-ous, 
he could not tell why. He must go and look at him. He 
would go very quiet-ly, of course ; so he swam round and round 
him, clos-er and clos-er ; and, as he did not stir, at last he came 
quite close and looked him in the face. 

The moon shone so bright that Tom could see every fea- 
ture ; and, as he saw, he rec-ol-lect-ed, bit by bit, it was his old 
mas-ter, Grimes. 

Tom turned tail, and swam away as fast as he could. 

“ Oh, dear me! ” he thought, “ now he will turn into a 
wa-ter ba-by. What a nas-ty trou-ble-some one he will be! 
And per-haps he will find me out, and beat me a-gain.” 

So he went up the riv-er a-gain a lit-tle way, and lay there 
the rest of the night un-der an al-der root ; but, when morn- 
ing came, he longed to go down a-gain to the big pool, and 
see wheth-er Mr. Grimes had turned into a wa-ter ba-by yet. 

So he went ver-y care-ful-ly, peep-ing round all the rocks, 
and hid-ing un-der all the roots. Mr. Grimes lay there still ; 
he had not turned into a wa-ter ba-by. In the af-ter-noon 
Tom went back again. He could not rest till he had found 


For Land-Babies 


47 


out what had be-come of Mr. Grimes. But this time Mr. 
Grimes was gone; and Tom made up his mind that he was 
turned in-to a wa-ter ba-by. 

He might have made him-self ea-sy, poor lit-tle man; Mr. 
Grimes did not turn into a wa-ter ba-by, or any-thing like one 
at all. But he did not make him-self ea-sy ; and a long time 
he was fear-ful lest he should meet Grimes sud-den-ly in some 
deep pool. He could not know that the fair-ies had car-ried 
him a-way, and put him where they put ev-er-y-thing which 
falls into the wa-ter, ex-act-ly where it ought to be. 

But Tom went on down, for he was a-fraid of stay-ing near 
Grimes ; and as he went, all the vale looked sad. The red and 
yel-low leaves show-ered down into the riv-er, the flies and 
bee-ties were all dead and gone, the chill au-tumn fog lay low 
up-on the hills, and some-times spread it-self so thick-ly on 
the riv-er that he could not see his way. But he felt his way 
in-stead. 

He did not care now for the tide be-ing a-gainst him. A 
red buoy was in sight, dan-cing in the o-pen sea; and to the 
buoy he would go, and to it he went. He passed great shoals 
of fishes, but nev-er heed-ed them, or they him; and once 
he passed a great black shin-ing seal 1 who was coming in af-ter 
the fishes. The seal put his head and should-ers out of the 
wa-ter and stared at him, look-ing ex-act-ly like a fat old 
greas-y ne-gro with a gray pate. And Tom, in-stead of be- 
ing fright-ened, said, “ How d’ye do, sir? what a beau-ti-ful 
place the sea is ! ” And the old seal, in-stead of try-ing to bite 
him, looked at him with his soft, sleep-y, wink-ing eyes, and 
said, “ Good tide to you, my lit-tle man; are you look-ing for 
your broth-ers and sis-ters? I passed them all at play out- 
side.” 


i seal: a fur-clad water animal. 


48 


Water-Babies 


“ Oh, then,” said Tom, “ I shall have play-f el-lows at last, ” 
and he swam on to the buoy, and got up-on it (for he was 
quite out of breath), and sat there, and looked round for 
wa-ter ba-bies ; but there were none to be seen. 

To have come all this way, and faced so ma-ny dan-gers, 
and yet to find no wa-ter ba-bies ! How hard ! W ell, it did 
seem hard; but peo-ple, even lit-tle ba-bies, can-not have all 
they want with-out wait-ing for it, and work-ing for it too, 
my lit-tle man, as you will find out some day. 

And Tom sat upon the buoy long days, long weeks, look-ing 
out to sea, and won-der-ing when the wa-ter ba-bies would 
come back ; and yet they nev-er came. 

Then he be-gan to ask all the strange things which came in 
out of the sea if they had seen any; and some said, “ Yes,” 
and some said noth-ing at all. 

But one day a-mong the rocks he found a play-fel-low. It 
was not a wa-ter ba-by, alas ! but it was a lob-ster ; and a ver-y 
dis-tin-guished lob-ster he was; for he had live bar-na-cles 
on his claws, which is a great mark of dis-tinc-tion in lob-ster- 
dom, and no more to be bought for mon-ey than a good con- 
science. 

Tom had nev-er seen a lob-ster be-fore, and he was might-i- 
ly tak-en with this one ; for he thought him the most cur-i-ous, 
odd, rid-ic-u-lous crea-ture he had ever seen; and there he 
was not far wrong. 

Tom asked him about wa-ter ba-bies. “ Yes,” he said. 
He had seen them of-ten. But he did not think much of them. 
They were med-dle-some lit-tle crea-tures, that went about 
help-ing fish and shells which got into scrapes. Well, for his 
part, he should be a-shamed to be helped by lit-tle soft crea- 
tures that had not even a shell on their backs. He had lived 
quite long e-nough in the world to take care of him-self . 


For Land-Babies 


49 


He was a con-ceit-ed fel-low, the old lob-ster, and not very 
civ-il to Tom ; and you will hear how he had to al-ter his mind 
before he was done, as con-ceit-ed peo-ple gen-er-al-ly have. 
But he was so fun-ny, and Tom so lone-ly, that he could not 
quar-rel with him ; and thev used to sit in holes on the rocks 
and chat for hours 



And a-bout this time there hap-pened to Tom a ver-y 
strange and im-por-tant ad-ven-ture — so im-por-tant, in- 
deed, that he was very near nev-er find-ing the wa-ter-ba-bies 
at all ; and I am sure you would have been sor-ry for that. 

Now it be-fell that on the ver-y shore, and o-ver the ver-y 
rocks, where Tom was sit-ting with his friend, the lob-ster, 


50 


Water-Babies 


there walked one day the lit-tle white la-dy, El-lie her-self, 
and with her a very wise man in-deed — Pro-f es-sor Ptthmlln- 
sprts . 1 

He was a very wor-thy, kind, good na-tured, lit-tle old gen- 
tle-man, and very fond of chil-dren, and ver-y good to all the 
world as long as it was good to him. El-lie and he were walk- 
ing on the rocks, and he was show-ing her about one in ten 
thou-sand of all the beau-ti-ful and cur-i-ous things which 
are to be seen there. But lit-tle El-lie was not sat-is-fied with 
them at all. She liked much bet-ter to play with live chil- 
dren, or even with dolls, which she could pre-tend were a-live ; 
and at last she said hon-est-ly, “ I don’t care a-bout all these 
things, be-cause they can’t play with me, or talk to me. If 
there were lit-tle chil-dren now in the wa-ter, as there used to 
be, and I could see them, I should like that.” 

“ Chil-dren in the wa-ter, you strange lit-tle duck? ” said 
the pro-fes-sor. 

“ Yes,” said El-lie. “ I know there used to be chil-dren in 
the wa-ter, and mer-maids 2 too, and mer-men . 3 I saw them 
all in a pic-ture at home, of a beau-ti-ful la-dy sail-ing in a 
car drawn by dol-phins, and ba-bies fly-ing round her, and 
one sit-ting in her lap; and the mer-maids swim-ming and 
mer-men trum-pet-ing on conch-shells; and there is a burn- 
ing moun-tain in the pic-ture be-hind. It hangs on the great 
stair-case, and I have looked at it ever since I was a ba-by, 
and dreamt about it a hun-dred times ; and it is so beau-ti-ful 
that it must be true.” 

Now, lit-tle El-lie was, I sup-pose, a stu-pid lit-tle girl; for 
in-stead of be-ing con-vinced by Pro-fes-sor Ptthmllnsprts’ 

i Pro-fes-sor Put-them-all-in-spirits. 

2-3 mermaids, mermen: fabled sea-people, the upper part of whose bodies were 
human, and the lower, fi 3 h. 


For Land-Babies 


51 


ar-gu-ments, she 011-ly asked the same ques-tion o-ver a-gain. 

“ But why are there not wa-ter-ba-bies ? ” 

I trust and hope that it was be-cause the pro-fes-sor trod 
at that mo-ment on the edge of a ver-y sharp mus-sel, and 
hurt one of his corns sad-ly, that he an-swered quite sharp-ly : 

“ Be-cause there ain’t.” 

Which was not e-ven good Eng-lish, my dear. 

And he groped with his net under the weeds so vio-lent-ly, 
that, as it hap-pened, he caught poor lit-tle Tom. 

He felt the net very heav-y, and lift-ed it out quick-ly, with 
Tom all en-tan-gled in the mesh-es. 

“ Bear me! ” he cried. “ What a large pink Hol-o-thu- 
ri-an ; 1 with hands too! It must be con-nect-ed with Syn- 
ap-ta .” 2 

And he took him out. 

“ It has ac-tu-al-ly eyes! ” he cried. “ Why, it must be a 
Ceph-a-lo-pod ! 3 This is most ex-traor-di-na-ry ! ” 

“ No, I ain’t! ” cried Tom, as loud as he could; for he did 
not like to be called bad names. 

“ It is a wa-ter ba-by! ” cried El-lie; and of course it was. 

“ Wa-ter fid-dle-sticks, my dear! ” said the pro-fes-sor, and 
he turned a- way sharp-ly. 

There was no de-ny-ing it. It was a wa-ter ba-by; though 
he had said a mo-ment ago that there were none. 

He now turned and poked Tom with his fin-ger, for want of 
any-thing bet-ter to do, and said care-less-ly , 4 4 My dear lit-tle 
maid, you must have dreamt of wa-ter ba-bies last night, your 
head is full of them.” 

Now, Tom had been in the most hor-ri-ble and un-speak-a- 
ble fright all the while; and had kept as qui-et as he could, 
though he was called a Hol-o-thu-ri-an and a Ceph-a-lo-pod; 

1-2-3 Holotlmrian, Synapta, Cephalopod: tech-ni*cal names of sea an-i-mals. 


52 


Water-Babies 


for it was fixed in his lit-tle head that if a man with clothes 
on caught him, he might put clothes on him too, and make a 
dir-ty black chim-ney-sweep of him a-gain. But, when the 
pro-fes-sor poked him, it was more than he could bear; and 
be-tween fright and rage, he turned to bay as val-iant-ly as 
a mouse in a cor-ner, and bit the pro-fes-sor ’s fin-ger till it 
bled. 

“ Oh! ah! yah! ” cried he; and glad of an ex-cuse to be rid 
of Tom, dropped him on to the sea- weed, and thence he dived 
into the wa-ter and was gone in a mo-ment. 

“ But it was a wa-ter ba-by, and I heard it speak! ” cried 
El-lie. “ Ah, it is gone! ” And she jumped down off the 
rock to try and catch Tom be-fore he slipped in-to the sea. 

Too late! and what was worse, as she sprang down, she 
slipped, and fell some six feet with her head on a sharp rock, 
and lay quite still. 

The pro-fes-sor picked her up, and tried to wak-en her, and 
called to her, and cried over her, for he loved her ver-y much ; 
but she would not wak-en at all. So he took her up in his 
arms, and car-ried her to her gov-er-ness, and they all went 
home; and lit-tle El-lie was put to bed, and lay there quite 
still ; on-ly now and then she woke up and called out a-bout 
the wa-ter-ba-by; but no one knew what she meant, and the 
pro-fes-sor did not tell, for he was a-shamed to tell. 

And, after a week, one moon-light night, the fair-ies came 
fly-ing in at the win-dow, and brought her such a pret-ty pair 
of wings that she could not help put-ting them on; and she 
flew with them out of the win-dow, and over the land, and 
over the sea, and up through the clouds, and no-bod-y heard 
or saw any-thing of her for a ver-y long while. 

And this is why they say that no one has ever yet seen a 
wa-ter ba-by. 


CHAPTER V. 


MRS. DO-AS-YOU-WOULD-BE-DONE-BY. 

But what be-came of lit-tle Tom? 

He slipped a-way off the rocks in-to the wa-ter, as I said 
be-f ore. But he could not help think-ing of lit-tle El-lie. He 
did not re-mem-ber who she was ; but he knew that she was a 
lit-tle girl, though she was a hun-dred times as big as he. 
That is not sur-pris-ing ; size has noth-ing to do with kin-dred. 
A ti-ny weed may be first cous-in to a great tree ; and a lit-tle 
dog like Vick knows that Li-o-ness is a dog too, though she 
is twen-ty times larg-er than her-self. So Tom knew that 
El-lie was a lit-tle girl, and thought a-bout her all that day, 
and longed to have had her to play with; hut he had ver-y 
soon to think of some-thing else. And here is the ac-count 
of what hap-pened to him. 

He was go-ing a-long the rocks in the wa-ter, and he saw a 
round cage of green twigs; and in-side it, look-ing ver-y 
much a-shamed of him-self, sat his friend the lob-ster, twid- 
dling his horns, in-stead of thumbs. 

“ What, have you been naught-y, and have they put you in 
the lock-up? ” asked Tom. 

The lob-ster felt a little in-dig-nant at such a no-tion, but 
he was too much de-pressed in spir-its to ar-gue ; so he on-ly 
said, “ I can’t get out.” 

“ Why did you get in? ” 

“ After that nas-ty piece of dead fish.” He had thought 

53 


54 


W ater-Babies 


it looked and smelt very nice when he was out-side, and so it 
did, for a lob-ster; but now he turned round and a-bused it 
be-cause he was an-gry with him-self . 

“ Where did you get in'? ” 

“ Through that round hole at the top.” 

“ Then, why don’t you get out through it? ” 

“ Be-cause I can’t,” and the lob-ster twid-dled his horns 
more fierce-ly than ev-er, but he was forced to con-fess, — 

“I have jumped up-wards, down- wards, back- wards, and 
side-ways, at least four thou-sand times, and I can’t get out; 
I al-wavs get up un-der-neath there, and can’t find the hole.” 

Tom looked at the trap, and hav-ing more wit than the 
lob-ster, he saw plain-ly e-nough what was the mat-ter; as 
you may if you will look at a lob-ster-pot. 

“ Stop a bit,” said Tom. “ Turn your tail up to me, and 
I’ll pull you through hind-fore-most, and then you won’t 
stick in the spikes.” 

But the lob-ster was so stu-pid and clum-sy that he couldn’t 
hit the hole. Like a great many fox-hunt-ers, he was very 
sharp as long as he was in his own coun-try; but as soon as 
they get out of it they lose their heads, and so the lob-ster, so 
to speak, lost his tail. 

Tom reached and clawed down the hole after him, till he 
caught hold of him; and then, as was to be ex-pect-ed, the 
clum-sy lob-ster pulled him in head-fore-most. 

“ Hul-lo! here is a pret-ty bus-iness,” said Tom. “ Now 
take your great claws, and break the points off those spikes, 
and then we shall both get out eas-i-ly.” 

“ Dear me, I nev-er thought of that,” said the lob-ster; 
“ and after all the ex-per-i-ence of life that I have had! ” 
You see, ex-per-i-ence is of very little good un-less a man, 
or a lob-ster, has wit e-nough to make use of it. 


For Land-Babies 


55 


But they had not got half the spikes a-way when they saw 
a great dark cloud over them ; and lo and be-hold, it was the 
ot-ter. 

How she did grin and grin when she saw Tom. “ Yar! ” 
said she, 66 you lit-tle med-dle-some wretch, I have you now! 
I will serve you out for tel-ling the salm-on where I was! ” 
And she crawled all o-ver the pot to get in. 

Tom was hor-ri-bly fright-ened, and still more fright-ened 
when she found the hole in the top, and squeezed her-self 
right down through it, all eyes and teeth. But no soon-er 
was her head in-side than val-i-ant Mr. Lob-ster caught her 
by the nose and held on. 

And there they were all three in the pot, roll-ing o-ver and 
o-ver, and very tight pack-ing it was. And the lob-ster tore 
at the ot-ter, and the ot-ter tore at the lob-ster, and both 
squeezed and thumped poor Tom till he had no breath left in 
his bod-y; and I don’t know what would have hap-pened to 
him if he had not at last got on the ot-ter ’s back, and safe out 
of the hole. 

He was right glad when he got out; but he would not de- 
sert his friend who had saved him, and the first time he saw 
his tail up-per-most he caught hold of it, and pulled with all 
his might. 

But the lob-ster would not let go. 

“ Come a-long,” said Tom; “ don’t you see she is dead? ” 
And so she was, quite drowned and dead. 

And that was the end of the wick-ed ot-ter. 

But the lob-ster would not let go. 

“ Come a-long, you stu-pid old stick-in-the-mud,” cried 
Tom, “ or the fish-er-man will catch you! ” And that was 
true, for Tom felt some one a-bove be-gin-ning to haul up 
the pot. 


56 


Water-Babies 


But the lob-ster would not let go. 

Tom saw the fish-er-man haul him up to the boat-side, and 
thought it all up with him. But when Mr. Lob-ster saw the 
fish-er-man, he gave such a fur-i-ous and tre-men-dous snap, 
that he snapped out of his hand, and out of the pot, and safe 
into the sea. But he left his knobbed claw be-hind him ; for 
it nev-er came into his stu-pid head to let go af-ter all, so he 
just shook his claw off as the eas-i-er meth-od. 

And now hap-pened to Tom a most won-der-f ul thing ; for he 
had not left the lob-ster five min-utes be-fore he came upon 
a wa-ter ba-by. 

A real live wa-ter ba-by, sit-ting on the white sand, very 
bu-sy a-bout a lit-tle point of rock. And when it saw Tom it 
looked up for a mo-ment, and then cried, “ Why, you are not 
one of us. You are a new ba-by! Oh, how de-light- f ul ! ” 

And it ran to Tom, and Tom ran to it; and they hugged 
and kissed each oth-er for ev-er so long, they did not know 
why. But they did not want any in-tro-duc-tions there un- 
der the wa-ter. 

At last, Tom said, “ Oh, where have you been all this while? 
I have been look-ing for you so long, and I have been so 
lone-ly.” 

“ We have been here for days and days. There are hun- 
dreds of us about the rocks. How was it you did not see us 
or hear us, when we sing and romp ev-er-y e-ven-ing be-fore 
we go home? ” 

Tom looked at the ba-by a-gain, and then he said, — 

u Well, this is won-der-ful! I have seen things just like 
you a-gain and a-gain, but I thought you were shells or sea- 
crea-tures. I nev-er took you for wa-ter ba-bies like my- 
self.” * 

Now, was not that very odd ? So odd, in deed, that you will, 


For Land-Babies 


57 


no doubt, want to know how it hap-pened, and why Tom could 
nev-er find a wa-ter ba-by till af-ter he had got the lob-ster out 
of the pot. And if you will read this sto-ry nine times o-ver, 
and then think for your-self, you will find out why. It is 
not good for lit-tle boys to be told ev-ery-thing, and nev-er to 
be forced to use their own wits. 

“ Now,” said the ba-by, “ come and help me, or I shall not 
have fin-ished be-fore my broth-ers and sis-ters come, and it 
is time to go home.” 

“ What shall I help you at? ” 

“ At this poor, dear lit-tle rock; a great clum-sy bowl-der 
came roll-ing by in the last storm, and knocked all its head 
off, and rubbed off all its flow-ers. And now I must plant it 
a-gain with beau-ti-ful sea-weeds and sea-flow-ers, and I will 
make it the pret-ti-est lit-tle rock-gar-den on all the shore.” 

So they worked a-way at the rock, and plant-ed it, and 
smoothed the sand down round it ; and cap-i-tal fun they had 
till the tide be-gan to turn. And then Tom heard all the 
other ba-bies com-ing, laugh-ing and sing-ing and shout-ing 
and romp-ing; and the noise they made was just like the noise 
of the rip-pie. So he knew that he had been hear-ing and 
see-ing the wa-ter ba-bies all a-long; on-ly he did not know 
them, be-cause his eyes and ears were not o-pened. 

And in they came, doz-ens and doz-ens of them, some big- 
ger than Tom and some small-er, all in the neat-est lit-tle white 
bath-ing dress-es; and when they found that he was a new 
ba-by they hugged him and kissed him, and then put him in 
the mid-cUe, and danced round him on the sand, and there 
was no one ev-er so hap-py as poor lit-tle Tom. 

“ Now, then,” they cried all at once, “ we must come a-way 
home, we must come a-way home, or the tide will leave us dry. 
We have mend-ed all the bro-ken sea-weed, and put all the 


58 


Water-Babies 


rock-pools in order, and plant-ed all the shells a-gain in the 
sand, and no-body will see where the ng-ly storm swept in last 
week.” 

And this is the rea-son why the rock-pools are al-ways so 
neat and clean ; be-cause the wa-ter-ba-bies come in-shore after 
ev-er-y storm to sweep them out, and comb them down, and 
put them all to rights a-gain. 

And where is the home of the wa-ter ba-bies ? In St. Bran- 
dan ’s fair-y isle . 1 

And there were the wa-ter ba-bies in thou-sands, more than 
Tom, or you ei-ther, could count. All the lit-tle chil-dren 
whom the good fair-ies take to, be-cause their cruel mothers 
and fathers will not. 

But I wish Tom had giv-en up all his naught-y tricks, and 
left off tor-ment-ing dumb an-i-mals, now that he had plen-ty 
of play-fel-lows to a-muse him. In-stead of that, I am sor-ry 
to say, he would med-dle with the crea-tures — all but the 
wa-ter-snakes, for they would stand no non-sense. So he 
tic-kled the sea cor-als to make them shut up, and fright- 
ened the crabs to make them hide in the sand and peep out at 
him with the tips of their eyes, and put stones into the a-nem- 
o-nes’ mouths to make them fan-cy that their din-ner was 
com-ing. 

The other chil-dren warned him, and said, “ Take care 
what you are at. Mrs. Be-done-by-as-you-did is com-ing.” 
But Tom never heed-ed them, be-ing quite ri-o-tous with high 
spir-its and good luck, till, one Fri-day morn-ing ear-ly, Mrs. 
Be-done-by-as-you-did came in-deed. 

A very tre-men-dous la-dy she was ; and when the chil-dren 
saw her they all stood in a row, very up-right in-deed, and 

iSt. Brandan: an Irish abbot of the sixth cen-tu-ry, whom tra-di-tion affirms 
owned a fly*ing is-land on which he sought to find the Islands of Par-a-dise. 


For Land-Babies 


59 


smoothed down their bath-ing dress-es, and put their hands 
be-hind them, just as if they were go-ing to be ex-am-ined by 
the in-spect-or. 

And she had on a black bon-net, and a black shawl, and no 
crin-o-line at all, and a pair of large green spec-ta-cles ; and 
a great hooked nose, hooked so much that the bridge of it 
stood quite up a-bove her eye-brows ; and un-der her arm she 
car-ried a great birch rod. In-deed, she was so ug-ly that 



“you are a very cru-el wom-an,” he said. 


Tom was tempt-ed to make fae-es at her, but did not; for he 
did not ad-mire the look of the birch rod un-der her arm. 

An d she looked at the chil-dren one by one, and seemed 
ver-y much pleased with them, though she nev-er asked them 
one ques-tion about how they were be-hav-ing; and then be- 
gan giv-ing them all sorts of nice sea-things, — sea-cakes, sea- 


60 


Water-Babies 


ap-ples, sea-or-an-ges, sea-bull’s-eyes, sea-tof-fee; and to the 
very best of all she gave sea-ices, made out of sea-cows’ cream, 
which nev-er melt un-der wa-ter. 

Now, lit-tle Tom watched all these sweet things giv-en a-way, 
till his mouth wa-tered, and his eyes grew as round as an 
owl’s. For he hoped that his turn would come at last; and 
so it did. For the la-dy called him up, and held out her 
fin-gers with some-thing in them, and popped it into his 
mouth; and, lo and be-hold, it was a nas-ty, cold, hard peb- 
ble. 

“ You are a very cru-el wom-an,” said he, and be-gan to 
whim-per. 

“ And you are a very cru-el boy, who puts peb-bles into 
the sea-a-nem-o-nes’ mouths, to take them in, and make them 
fan-cy that they had caught a good din-ner! As you did to 
them, so I must do to you.” 

“ Who told you that? ” said Tom. 

“ You did your-self, this very min-ute.” 

Tom had never o-pened his lips, so he was ver-y much tak- 
en a-back in-deed. 

“ Yes; ev-er-y one tells me ex-act-ly what they have done 
wrong ; and that with-out know-ing it them-selves. So there 
is no use try-ing to hide any-thing from me. Now go, and 
be a good boy, and I will put no more peb-bles in your mouth, 
if you put none in oth-er crea-tures’.” 

“ I did not know there was any harm in it,” said Tom. 

“ Then you know now. Peo-ple con-tin-u-ally say that to 
me; but I tell them, if you don’t know that fire burns, that is 
no rea-son that it should not burn you ; and if you don ’t know 
that dirt breeds fe-ver, that is no rea-son why the fe-vers 
should not kill you. The lob-ster did not know that there was 


For Land-Babies 


61 


any harm in get-ting into the lob-ster-pot ; but it caught him 
all the same.” 

“ Dear me,” thought Tom, 44 she knows ev-er-y-thing ! ” 
And so she did, in-deed. 

“ And so, if you do not know that things are wrong, that 
is no rea-son why you should not be pun-ished for them; 
though not as much, not as much, my lit-tle man ” (and the 
la-dy looked ver-y kind-ly, after all), 44 as if you did know.” 

44 Well, you are a lit-tle hard on a poor lad,” said Tom. 

44 Not at all; I am the best friend you ever had in all your 
life. But I will tell you ; I can not help pun-ish-ing peo-ple 
when they do wrong. I like it no more than they do ; I am 
of-ten very, very sor-ry for them, poor things ; but I can not 
help it. If I tried not to do it, I should do it all the same. 
For I work by ma-chin-er-y, just like an en-gine; and am 
full of wheels and springs in-side, and am wound up ver-y 
care-ful-ly, so that I can-not help go-ing.” 

4 4 Was it long a-go since they wound you up? ” asked Tom. 
For he thought, the cun-ning lit-tle f el-low, 44 She will run 
down some day, or they may for-get to wind her up, as old 
Grimes used to for-get to wind up his watch when he came in 
from the pub-lie-house, and then I shall be safe.” 

44 I was wound up once and for all, so long a-go that I for- 
get all a-bout it.” 

44 Dear me,” said Tom, 44 you must have been made a long 
time! ” 

44 I nev-er was made, my child; and I shall go for ev-er and 
ev-er; for I am as old as B-ter-ni-ty, and yet as young as 
Time.” 

And there came o-ver the la-dy’s face a ver-y cu-ri-ous ex- 
pression — ver-y sol-emn, and ver-y sad, and yet ver-y, ver-y 
sweet. And she looked up and a-way, as if she were gaz-ing 


62 


Water-Babies 


through the sea, and through the sky, at some-thing far, far 
off ; and as she did so, there came such a qui-et, ten-der, pa- 
tient, hope-ful smile over her face that Tom thought for the 
mo-ment that she did not look ug-ly at all. And no more she 
did; for she was like a great ma-ny peo-ple who have not a 
pret-ty fea-ture in their fac-es, and yet are love-ly to be-hold, 
and draw lit-tle chil-dren’s hearts to them at once; be-cause 
though the house is plain e-nough, yet from the win-dows a 
beau-ti-ful and good spir-it is look-ing forth. 

And Tom smiled in her face, she looked so pleas-ant for the 
mo-ment. And the strange fair-y smiled too, and said, — 

“ Yes. You thought me very ug-ly just now, did you not ? ” 
Tom hung down his head, and got very red a-bout the ears. 
“ And I am very ug-ly. I am the ug-li-est fair-y in the 
world ; and I shall be, till people be-have them-selves as they 
ought to do. And then I shall grow as hand-some as my sis- 
ter, who is the love-li-est fair-y in the world ; and her name is 
Mrs. Do-as-you-would-be-done-by. So she be-gins where I 
end, and I be-gin where she ends ; and those who will not lis- 
ten to her must lis-ten to me, as you will see. 

“ And now do you be a good boy, and do as you would be 
done by, which they did not ; and then, when my sis-ter, Mad- 
ame Do-as-you-would-be-done-by, comes on Sun-day, per- 
haps she will take no-tice of you, and teach you how to be- 
have. She un-der-stands that bet-ter than I do.” And so 
she went. 

Tom was very glad to hear that there was no chance of meet- 
ing Grimes a-gain, though he was a lit-tle sor-ry for him; but 
he de-ter-mined to be a good boy all Sat-ur-day; and he was; 
for he nev-er fright-ened one crab, nor tic-kled any live cor- 
als, nor put stones into the sea-a-nem-o-nes’ mouths to make 
them fan-cy they had got a din-ner ; and when Sun-day morn- 


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63 


mg came, sure e-nough, Mrs. Do-as-you-would-be-done-by 
came too. Where-at all the lit-tle chil-dren be-gan danc-ing 
and clap-ping their hands, and Tom danced too with all his 
might. 

And as for the pret-ty lady, I can not tell you what the 
col-or of her hair was, or of her eyes : no more could Tom ; for, 
when any one looks at her, all they can think of is that she 
has the sweet-est, kind-est, ten-der-est, fun-ni-est, mer-ri-est 
face they ever saw, or want to see. But Tom saw that she 
was a ver-y tall wom-an, as tall as her sis-ter; hut in-stead 
of be-ing gnar-ly and horn-y, and scal-y and prick-ly, like her, 
she was the most nice, soft, fat, smooth, pus-sy, cud-dly, de- 
li-cious crea-ture who ever nursed a baby; and she under- 
stood ba-bies thor-ough-ly, for she had plen-ty of her own, 
whole rows and reg-i-ments of them, and has to this day. 
And all her de-light was, when-ev-er she had a spare mo-ment, 
to play with ba-bies, in which she showed her-self a woman 
of sense ; for ba-bies are the best com-pan-y and the pleas-ant- 
est play-fel-lows in the world, at least, so all the wise peo-ple 
in the world think. And there-fore when the chil-dren saw 
her, they nat-u-ral-ly all caught hold of her, and pulled her 
till she sat down on a stone, and climbed in-to her lap, and 
clung round her neck, and caught hold of her hands; and 
then they all put their thumbs into their mouths, and be-gan 
cud-dling and pur-ring like so ma-ny kit-tens, as they ought 
to have done. While those who could get no-where else sat 
down on the sand and cud-died her feet ; for no one, you know, 
wears shoes in the wa-ter, ex-cept hor-rid old bath-ing-wom- 
en, who are a-fraid of the wa-ter ba-bies pinch-ing their 
horn-y toes. And Tom stood star-ing at them; for he could 
not un-der-stand what it was all a-bout. 

“ And who are you, you lit-tle dar-ling? ” she said. 


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Water-Babies 


“ Oh, that is the new ba-by! ” they all cried, pull-ing their 
thumbs out of their mouths; “ and he nev-er had any moth- 
er; ” and they all put their thumbs back a-gain, for they did 
not wish to lose an-y time. 

“ Then I will be his moth-er, and he shall have the very 
best place; so get out, all of you, this mo-ment.” 

But she took Tom in her arms, and laid him in the soft-est 
place of all, and kissed him, and pat-ted him, and talked to 
him, ten-der-ly and low, such things as he had nev-er heard 
be-f ore in his life ; and Tom looked up into her eyes, and loved 
her, and loved, till he fell fast a-sleep from pure love. 

And when he woke she was tell-ing the chil-dren a sto-ry. 
And what sto-ry did she tell them ? One sto-ry she told them, 
which be-gins every Christ-mas Eve, and yet nev-er ends at 
all for ev-er and ev-er ; and as she went on, the chil-dren took 
their thumbs out of their mouths and lis-tened quite se-ri- 
ous-ly; but not sad-ly at all; for she nev-er told them any- 
thing sad; and Tom lis-tened too, and nev-er grew tired of 
lis-ten-ing. And he lis-tened so long that he fell fast a-sleep 
a-gain, and, when he woke, the la-dy was nurs-ing him still. 

“ Don’t go a- way,” said lit-tle Tom. “ This is so nice. I 
nev-er had any one to cud-dle me be-f ore.” 

“ Don’t go a-way,” said all the chil-dren; “ you have not 
sung us one song.” 

“ Well, I have time for only one. So what shall it be? ” 

“ The doll you lost! The doll you lost! ” cried all the ba- 
bies at once. 

So the strange fair-y sang: — 

I once had a sweet little doll , dears, 

The pret-ti-est doll in the world; 

Her cheeks were so red and so white, dears, 


For Land-Babies 


65 


And her hair was so charm-ing-ly curled . 

But I lost my poor little doll , dears , 

As I played in the heath one day; 

And I cried for her more than a week , dears , 

But I nev-er could find where she lay . 

I found my poor lit-tle doll , dears , 

As I played in the heath one day; 

Folks say she is ter-ri-bly changed , dears , 

For her paint is all washed away , 

And her arm trod-den off by the cows , dears , 

And her hair not the least bit curled; 

Yet , for old sakes y sake she is still, dears, 

The pret-ti-est doll in the world. 

u Now,” said the fair-y to Tom, u will you be a good boy 
for my sake, and tor-ment no more sea-beasts till I come 
back? ” 

“ And you will cud-dle me a-gain? ” said poor lit-tle Tom. 

“ Of course I will, you lit-tle duck. I should like to take 
you with me and cud-dle you all the way, only I must not.” 
And away she went. 

So Tom re-al-ly tried to be a good boy, and tor-ment-ed no 
sea-beasts after that as long as he lived ; and he is quite a-live, 
I as-sure you, still. 

Oh, how good lit-tle boys ought to be who have kind pus-sy 
mam-mas to cud-dle them and tell them sto-ries; and how 
a-fraid they ought to be of grow-ing naught-y, and bring-ing 
tears into their mam-mas’ pret-ty eyes! 


CHAPTER VI. 


MRS. BE-D0NE-BY-AS-Y0U-DID. 

Here I come to the sad-dest part of all my sto-ry. I know 
some peo-ple will on-ly laugh at it. But I know one man 
who would not ; and he was an of-fi-cer with a pair of long 
gray mus-tach-es, who said once that two of the most heart- 
rending sights in the world, which moved him most to tears, 
which he would do any-thing to pre-vent or rem-e-dy, were a 
child over a bro-ken toy, and a child steal-ing sweets. 

Those who heard him did not laugh at him ; but, af-ter he 
was gone, they called him sen-ti-men-tal and so forth, all but 
one dear lit-tle old Qua-ker la-dy with a soul as white as her 
cap, who was not, of course, par-ti-al to sol-diers; and she 
said very qui-et-ly, like a Quak-er : — 

“ Friends, it is borne upon my mind that that is a tru-ly 
brave man.’ , 

Now you may fan-cy that Tom was quite good, when he 
had ev-er-y-thing that he could want or wish ; but you would 
be much mis-tak-en. Be-ing quite com-fort-a-ble is a good 
thing; but it does not make peo-ple good. In-deed, it some- 
times makes them naugh-ty. And I am sor-ry to say that this 
hap-pened to lit-tle Tom. For he grew so fond of the sea- 
bulFs-eyes 1 and sea-lol-li-pops 2 that his fool-ish lit-tle head 
could think of noth-ing else ; and he was al-ways long-ing for 
more, and won-der-ing when the strange la-dy would come 

1-2 bull's-eyes, lollipops: candied sweets. 

66 


For Land-Babies 


67 


a-gain and give him some, and what she would give him, and 
how much, and wheth-er she would give him more than the 
others. And he thought of noth-ing but lol-li-pops by day, 
and dreamt of noth-ing else by night — and what hap-pened 
then'? 

That he be-gan to watch the lady to see where she kept the 
sweet things, and be-gan hid-ing, and sneak-ing, and fol-low- 
ing her a-bout, and seem-ing to be look-ing the other way, or 
go-ing af-ter some-thing else, till he found out that she kept 
them in a beau-ti-ful moth-er-of -pearl cab-i-net a-way in a 
deep crack of the rocks. 

And he longed to go to the cab-i-net, and yet he was a-f raid ; 
and then he longed a-gain, and was less a-fraid; and at last, 
by con-stant think-ing about it, he longed so much that he was 
not a-fraid at all. And one night, when all the other chil- 
dren were a-sleep, and he could not sleep for think-ing of lol- 
li-pops, he crept away among the rocks, and got to the cab-i- 
net, and be-hold ! it was o-pen ! 

But, when he saw all the nice things in-side, in-stead of 
being de-light-ed, he was quite fright-ened, and wished he 
had nev-er come there. And then he would on-ly touch them, 
and he did ; and then he would on-ly taste one, and he did ; 
and then he would on-ly eat one, and he did ; and then he would 
on-ly eat tw T o and then three, and so on ; and then he was ter- 
ri-fied lest she should come and catch him, and be-gan gob- 
bling them down so fast that he did not taste them, or have 
any pleas-ure in them ; and then he felt sick, and would have 
on-ly one more; and then on-ly one more again, and so on 
till he had eat-en them all up. 

And all the while, close be-hind him, stood Mrs. Be-done-by- 
as-you-did. 

Some peo-ple may say, “ But why did she not keep her cup- 


68 


Water-Babies 


board locked ? ” Well, I know. It may seem a strange thing, 
but she nev-er does keep her cup-board locked; ev-er-y one 
may go and taste for them-selves, and fare ac-eord-ing-ly. It 
is very odd, but so it is ; and I am quite sure that she knows 
best. Per-haps she wish-es peo-ple to keep their fin-gers out 
of the fire by having them burned. She took off her spec-ta- 
cles, as she did not like to see too much; and just said noth-ing 
at all a-bout the mat-ter, not e-ven when Tom came next day 
with the rest for sweet things. He was great-ly a-fraid of 
com-ing; but he was still more a-fraid of stay-ing a-w T ay, lest 
any one should sus-pect him. He was a-faid, too, lest there 
should be no sweets, — as was to be ex-pect-ed, he hav-ing 
eat-en them all, — and lest the fair-y should in-quire who had 
tak-en them. But, be-hold! she pulled out just as ma-ny as 
ev-er, which as-ton-ished Tom, and fright-ened him still more. 

And when the fair-y looked him full in the face, he shook 
from head to foot; however, she gave him his share like the 
rest, and he thought with-in him-self that she could not have 
found him out. 

But when he put the sweets into his mouth, he hat-ed the 
taste of them ; and they made him so sick that he had to get 
a- way as fast as he could; and ver-y sick he was, and cross 
and un-hap-py all the week af-ter. 

Then, when next week came, he had his share a-gain ; and 
a-gain the fair-y looked him full in the face, but more sad-ly 
than she had ev-er looked. And he could not bear the sweets, 
but took them a-gain in spite of him-self. 

And when Mrs. Do-as-you-would-be-done-by came, he want- 
ed to be cud-died like the rest ; but she said ver-y grave-ly : — 

6 6 1 should like to cud-dle you, but I can not, you are so 
horn-y and prick-ly.” 


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69 


And Tom looked at him-self ; and he was all o-ver pric-kles, 
just like a sea-egg. 

Which was quite nat-u-ral; for you must know and be- 
lieve that peo-ple’s souls make their bod-ies just as a snail 
makes its shell (I am not jok-ing, my lit-tle lit-tle man; I am 
in sol-emn earn-est). And there-fore, when Tom’s soul grew 
all prick-ly with naught-y tempers, his bod-y could not help 
grow-ing prick-ly too, so that no-body would cud-dle him, or 
play with him, or e-ven like to look at him. 

What could Tom do now but go a- way and hide in a cor-ner 
and cry ? For no-body would play with him, and he knew full 
well why. 

And he was so mis-er-a-ble all that week that when the 
ug-ly f air-y came and looked at him once more full in the face, 
more se-ri-ous-ly and sad-ly than ever, he could stand it no 
long-er, and thrust the sweet-meats a- way, say-ing, “ No, I 
don’t want any; I can’t bear them now; ” and then burst out 
cry-ing, poor lit-tle man, and told Mrs. Be-done-by-as-you-did 
every word as it hap-pened. 

He was much fright-ened when he had done so ; for he ex- 
pect-ed her to pun-ish him se-vere-ly. But in-stead, she only 
took him up and kissed him, which was not quite pleas-ant, 
for her chin was very bris-tly too ; but he was so down-heart- 
ed, that he thought that rough kiss-ing was bet-ter than none. 

“ I will for-give you, lit-tle man,” she said. “ I al-ways 
for-give ev-er-y one the mo-ment they tell me the truth of 
their own will.” 

“ Then you will take a-way all these nas-ty pric-kles'? ” 

“ That is a ver-y dif-fer-ent mat-ter. You put them there 
your-self, and on-ly you can take them a-way.” 

“ But how can I do that? ” asked Tom, cry-ing a-fresh. 

“ Well, I think it is time for you to go to school; so I shall 


70 


Water-Babies 


fetch you a sehool-mis-tress, who will teach you how to get 
rid of your pric-kles.” And so she went a- way. 

Tom was fright-ened at the no-tion of a school-mis-tress ; 
for he thought she would cer-tain-ly come with a birch-rod 
or a cane ; but he com-f ort-ed him-self, at last, that she might 
be some-thing like the old wom-an in Ven-dale — which she 
was not in the least; for, when the fair-y brought her, she 



TOM PUT HIS FIN-GER IN HIS MOUTH, AND LOOKED AT HER UNDER HIS BROWS, FOR HE WAS 

A-SHAMED OF HIM-SELF. 


was the most beau-ti-ful lit-tle girl that ever was seen, with 
long curls float-ing be-hind her like a gold-en cloud, and long 
robes float-ing all round her like a sil-ver one. 

“ There he is,” said the fair-y; “ and you must teach him 
to be good, wheth-er you like or not.” 

“ I know,” said the lit-tle girl; but she did not seem quite 
to like, for she put her fin-ger in her mouth, and looked at 



For Land-Babies 


71 


Tom un-der her brows ; and Tom put his fin-ger in his mouth, 
and looked at her un-der his brows, for he was a-shamed of 
him-self. 

The lit-tle girl seemed hard-ly to know how to be-gin ; and 
per-haps she would nev-er have be-gun at all if poor Tom 
had not burst out cry-ing, and begged her to teach him to be 
good and help him to cure his pric-kles ; and at that she grew 
so ten-der-heart-ed that she be-gan teach-ing him as pret-ti-ly 
as ev-er child was taught in the world. 

And what did the lit-tle girl teach Tom? She taught him, 
first, what you have been taught ev-er since you said your 
first pray-ers at your moth-er’s knees; but she taught him 
much more sim-ply. For the les-sons in that world, my child, 
have no such hard words in them as the les-sons in this, and 
there-fore the wa-ter-ba-bies like them bet-ter than you like 
your les-sons, and long to learn them more and more; and 
grown men cannot puz-zle nor quar-rel over their mean-ing, 
as they do here on land. 

So she taught Tom ev-er-y day in the week ; on-ly on Sun- 
days she al-ways went a-way home, and the kind fair-y took 
her place. And be-fore she had taught Tom many Sun-days, 
his pric-kles had van-ished quite away, and his skin was 
smooth and clean a-gain. 

“ Dear me! ” said the lit-tle girl; “ why, I know you now. 
You are the ver-y same lit-tle chim-ney-sweep who came into 
my bed-room.” 

“ Dear me! ” cried Tom. “ And I know you too, now. 
You are the very lit-tle white lady whom I saw in bed. ” And 
he jumped at her, and longed to hug and kiss her ; but did not, 
re-mem-ber-ing that she was a la-dy born ; so he on-ly jumped 
round and round her till he was quite tired. 

And then they be-gan tell-ing each oth-er all their sto-ry — 


72 


Water-Babies 


how he had got in-to the wa-ter, and she had fal-len o-ver the 
rock; and how he had swam down to the sea; and how she 
had flown out of the win-dow; and how this, that, and the 
oth-er, till it was all talked out; and then they both be-gan 
over a-gain, and I can’t say which of the two talked fast-est. 

And then they set to work at their les-sons a-gain, and both 
liked them so well that they went on, well, till sev-en full years 
were past and gone. 

You may fan-cy that Tom was quite con-tent and hap-py 
all those sev-en years ; but the truth is, he was not. He had 
al-ways one thing on his mind, and that was, — where lit-tle 
Ellie went, when she went home on Sun-days. 

To a very beau-ti-ful place, she said. But what was the 
beau-ti-ful place like, and where was it ? 

Ah ! that is just what she could not say. 

“ You must ask the fai-ries that.” 

So when the fai-ry, Mrs. Be-done-by-as-you-did came, Tom 
asked her. 

“ Come here,” she now said sooth-ing-ly, “ and see what 
hap-pens to peo-ple who do on-ly what is pleas-ant.” 

And she took out of one of the cup-boards (she had all sorts 
of strange cup-boards in the cracks of the rocks) the most 
won-der-ful water-proof book, full of such pho-to-graphs as 
nev-er were seen. And on the ti-tle-page was writ-ten, 4 4 The 
His-tory of the great and fa-mous na-tion of the Do-as-you- 
likes, who came away from the coun-try of Hard-work, be- 
cause they want-ed to play on the jews ’-harp all day long.” 

In the first pic-ture they saw these Do-as-you-likes liv-ing 
in the land of Read-y-made, at the foot of the Hap-py-go- 
luck-y Moun-tains, where flap-doo-dle grows wild; and if you 
want to know what that is you must read “ Pe-ter Sim-ple.” 1 

“i Peter Simple: a story by Cap-tain Mar-ry-at, an Eng-lish na-val of-fi-cer and 
nov-el-ist, 


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73 


They lived very much such a life as those jol-ly old Greeks 
in Sic-i-ly, whom you may see paint-ed on the an-cient vas-es ; 
and real-ly there seemed to be great ex-cus-es for them, for 
they had no need to work. 

In-stead of hous-es they lived in beau-ti-ful caves, and 
bathed in the warm springs three times a day; and as for 
clothes, it was so warm there that the gen-tle-men walked 
a-bout in lit-tle be-side a cocked hat and a pair of straps, or 
some light sum-mer tac-kle of that kind; and the ladies all 
gath-ered gos-sa-mer in au-tumn (when they were not too 
la-zy) to make their win-ter dress-es. 

They were very fond of mu-sic, but it was too much trou-ble 
to learn the pi-a-no or the vi-o-lin ; and as for danc-ing, that 
would have been too great an ex-er-tion. So they sat on 
ant-hills all day long, and played on the jews ’-harp; and if 
the ants bit them, why, they just got up and went to the next 
ant-hill, till they were bit-ten there too. 

And they sat -under the flap-doo-dle-trees, and let the flap- 
doo-dle drop into their mouths; and un-der the vines, and 
squeezed the grape- juice down their throats ; and, if any lit- 
tle pigs ran about read-y roast-ed, cry-ing, 4 4 Come and eat 
me,” as was their fash-ion in that coun-try, they wait-ed till 
the pigs ran a-gainst their mouths, and then took a bite, and 
were con-tent, as so many oys-ters would have been. 

They need-ed no weap-ons, for no en-e-mies ev-er came near 
their land ; and no tools, for ev-er-y-thing was read-y made to 
their hand; and the stern old fair-y Ne-ces-si-ty nev-er came 
near them to hunt them up, and make them use their wits, 
or die. 

And so on, and so on, till there were nev-er such com-f ort-a- 
ble, eas-y-go-ing, hap-py-go-luck-y peo-ple in the world. 

“ Well, that is a jol-ly life,” said Tom, 


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Water-Babies 


“ You think so? ” said the fair-y. “ Do you see that great 
peaked moun-tain there be-hind,” said the fair-y, “with smoke 
com-ing out of its top? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ And do you see all those ash-es and slag and cin-ders 
ly-ing a-bout? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ Then turn over the next five hun-dred years, and you will 
see what hap-pens next.” 

And be-hold the moun-tain had blown up like a bar-rel of 
gun-pow-der, and then boiled over like a ket-tle; where-by 
one-third of the Do-as-you-likes were blown into the air, and 
an-oth-er third were smoth-ered in ash-es, so that there was 
only one-third left. 

“You see,” said the fair-y, “ what comes of liv-ing on a 
bum-ing moun-tain.” 

“ Oh, why did you not warn them? ” said lit-tle Ellie. 

“ I did warn them all that I could. I let the smoke come 
out of the moun-tain ; and wher-ev-er there is smoke there is 
fire. And I laid the ashes and cin-ders all a-bout ; and wher- 
ev-er there are cin-ders, cin-ders may be a-gain. But they did 
not like to face facts, my dears, as ver-y few peo-ple do ; and 
so they in-vent-ed a cock-and-bull sto-ry, which, I am sure, I 
nev-er told them, that the smoke was the breath of a gi-ant, 
whom some gods or oth-er had bur-ied un-der the moun-tain ; 
and that the cin-ders were what the dwarfs roast-ed the lit-tle 
pigs whole with, and oth-er non-sense of that kind. And, 
when folks are in that hu-mor, I can-not teach them, save by 
the good old birch rod.” 

And then she turned over the next five hun-dred years ; and 
there were the rem-nant of the Do-as-you-likes, do-ing as they 
liked, as be-fore. They were too la-zy to move a-way from 


For Land-Babies 


75 


the moun-tain; so they said, “If it has blown up once, that 
is all the more rea-son that it should not blow up a-gain. ‘ ’ And 
they were few in num-ber ; but they on-ly said, “ The more the 
mer-ri-er, but the few-er the bet-ter fare.” How-ev-er, that 
was not quite true; for all the flap-doo-dle-trees were killed 
by the vol-ca-no, and they had eat-en all the roast pigs, who, 
of course, could not be ex-pect-ed to have lit-tle ones. So 
they had to live ver-y hard, on nuts and roots which they 
scratched out of the ground with sticks. Some of them talked 
of sow-ing corn, as their an-ces-tors used to do be-fore they 
came in-to the land of Read-y-made ; but they had f or-got-ten 
how to make plows (they had for-got-ten even how to make 
jews ’-harps by this time), and had eat-en all the seed-corn 
which they brought out of the land of Hard- work years since ; 
and, of course, it was too much trou-ble to go a-way and find 
more. So they lived mis-er-a-bly on roots and nuts, and all 
the weak-ly lit-tle chil-dren died. 

“ Why,” said Tom, “ they are grow-ing no bet-ter than 
sav-ages.” 

“ And look how ug-ly they are all get-ting,” said El-lie. 

“ Yes; when peo-ple live on poor veg-et-a-bles in-stead of 
roast beef and plum-pud-ding, that is what hap-pens.” 

And she turned over the next five hun-dred years. And 
there they were all liv-ing up in trees, and mak-ing nests to 
keep off the rain. And un-der-neath the trees li-ons were 
prowl-ing a-bout. 

“ Why,” said El-lie, “ the li-ons seem to have eat-en a good 
ma-ny of them, for there are very few left now.” 

“ Yes,” said the fair-y; “ you see it was on-ly the strong- 
est and most ac-tive ones who could climb the trees, and so 
es-cape.” 


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Water-Babies 


“ But what great, hulk-ing, broad-shoul-dered chaps they 
are,” said Tom; “ they are a rough lot as ever I saw.” 

“ Yes, they are get-ting very strong now; for the la-dies 
will not mar-ry any but the very strong-est and fierc-est gen- 
tle-men, who can help them up the trees out of the li-ons’ 
way.” 

And she turned over the next five hun-dred years. And 
in that they were f ew-er still, and strong-er and fierc-er ; but 
their feet had changed shape very odd-ly, for they laid hold 
of the branches with their great toes, as if they had been 
thumbs, just as a Hin-du tai-lor uses his toes to thread his 
nee-dle. 

The chil-dren were much sur-prised, and asked the fair-y 
wheth-er that was her do-ing. 

“ Yes, and no,” she said, smil-ing. “ It was on-ly those 
who could use their feet as well as their hands who could get 
a good liv-ing, or, in-deed, get mar-ried; so that they got the 
best of ev-er-y-thing, and starved out all the rest; and those 
who are left keep up a reg-u-lar breed of toe-thumb-men, as 
a breed of short-horns, or Skye-ter-ri-ers, or fan-cy pi-geons 
is kept up.” 

“ But there is a hair-y one a-mong them,” said El-lie. 

“ Ah! ” said the fair-y, “ that will be a great man in his 
time, and chief of all the tribe.” 

And, when she turned over the next five hun-dred years, it 
was true. 

For this hair-y chief had had hair-y chil-dren, and they 
hair-i-er chil-dren still; and ev-er-y one wished to mar-ry 
hair-y hus-bands, and have hair-y chil-dren too; for the cli- 
mate was grow-ing so damp that none but the hair-y ones 
could live; all the rest coughed and sneezed, and had sore 


For Land-Babies 


77 


throats, and went into con-sump-tion, be-fore they could grow 
up to be men and wom-en. 

Then the fair-y turned over the next five hun-dred years. 
And they were few-er still. 

“ Why, there is one on the ground pick-ing up roots,’ ’ said 
El-lie, “ and he can-not walk up-right.” 

No more he could; for in the same way that the shape of 
their feet had altered, the shape of their backs had al-tered 
al-so. 

“ Why,” cried Tom, “ I de-clare they are all apes.” 

“ Some-thing fear-ful-ly like it, poor fool-ish crea-tures,” 
said the fai-ry. “ They are grown so stu-pid now, that they 
can hard-ly think ; for none of them have used their wits for 
many hun-dred years. They have al-most for-got-ten, too, 
how to talk. For each stu-pid child for-got some of the words 
it heard from its stu-pid par-ents, and had not wits e-nough 
to make fresh words for it-self. Be-sides, they are grown so 
fierce and sus-pi-cious and bru-tal that they keep out of each 
oth-er’s way, and mope and sulk in the dark for-ests, nev-er 
hear-ing each oth-er’s voice, till they have for-got-ten al-most 
what speech is like. I am a-fraid they will all be apes ver-y 
soon, and all by doing on-ly what they liked.” 

And in the next five hun-dred years they were all dead and 
gone, by bad food and wild beasts and hun-ters — all save one 
great old f el-low with jaws like a jack, who stood full sev-en 
feet high ; and he was shot and died. 

And that was the end of the great and jol-ly na-tion of the 
Do-as-you-likes. And when Tom and El-lie came to the end 
of the book, they looked very sad and sol-emn, and they had 
good rea-son so to do. 


78 


Water-Babies 


“ But could you not have saved them from be-com-ing 
apes ? ” said lit-tle El-lie at last. 

6 i At first, my dear ; if on-ly they would have be-haved like 
men, and set to work to do what they did not like. But the 
long-er they wait-ed, and be-haved like the dumb beasts who 
on-ly do what they like, the stu-pid-er and clum-si-er they 
grew ; till at last they were past all cure, for they had thrown 
their own wits a-way. It is such things as this that help to 
make me so ug-ly that I know not when I shall grow fair.” 

“ And where are they all now? 99 asked El-lie. 

“ Ex-act-ly where they ought to be, my dear.” 

“ Yes! ” said the fairy sol-emn-ly, half to her-self, as she 
closed the won-der-ful book. “ Folks say now that I can 
make beasts into men, by cir-cum-stance and se-lec-tion and 
com-pe-ti-tion, and so forth. Well, per-haps they are right; 
and per-haps, a-gain, they are wrong. That is one of the sev- 
en things which I am f or-bid-den to tell. What-ev-er their an- 
cestors were, men they are; and I ad- vise them to be-have 
as such, and act as such. But let them rec-ol-lect this, that 
there are two sides to ev-er-y question, and a down-hill as 
well as an up-hill road ; and if I can turn beasts into men, I 
can, by the same laws of cir-cum-stance and se-lec-tion and 
com-pe-ti-tion, turn men into beasts. You were ve-ry near 
being turned into a beast once or twice, little Tom. In-deed, 
if you had not made up your mind to go on this jour-ney, and 
see the world, like an Eng-lish-man, I am not sure but that 
you would have end-ed as an eft in a pond. ” 

“ Oh, dear me! ” said Tom; “ soon-er than that, and be all 
o-ver slime, I’ll go this min-ute, if it is to the world’s end.” 


CHAPTER VII. 


THE OTHER END OF NO- WHERE. 

“ Now,” said Tom, “ I am read-y to be off, if it’s to the 
world ’s end. ’ ’ 

“ Ah! ” said the fair-y, “ that is a brave, good boy. But 
you must go far-ther than the world’s end, if you want to find 
Mr. Grimes; for he is at the Oth-er-end-of -No- where. You 
must go to Shiny Wall, and through the white gate that nev-er 
was o-pened ; and then you will come to Peace-pool, and Moth- 
er Ca-rey’s Ha-ven, where the good whales go when they die. 
And there Moth-er Ca-rey will tell you the way to the Oth-er- 
end-of-No-where, and there you will find Mr. Grimes.” 

“ Oh, dear! ” said Tom. “ But I do not know my way to 
Shiny Wall, or where it is at all.” 

“ Lit-tle boys must take the trou-ble to find out things for 
them-selves or they will nev-er grow to be men; so that you 
must ask all the beasts in the sea and the birds in the air, and 
if you have been good to them, some of them will tell you the 
way to Shiny Wall.” 

“ Well,” said Tom, “ it will be a long jour-ney, so I had 
better start at once. Good-by, Miss El-lie; you know I am 
get-ting a big boy, and I must go out and see the world.” 

“ I know you must,” said El-lie; “but you will not for-get 
me, Tom. I shall wait here till you come.” 

And she shook hands with him, and bade him good-by. Tom 
longed very much a-gain to kiss her ; but he thought it would 

79 


80 


Water-Babies 


not be re-spect-ful, as she was a la-dy born, so he prom-ised not 
to for-get her; but his lit-tle whirl-a-bout of a head was so 
full of the no-tion of go-ing out to see the world, that it for- 
got her in five min-utes; how-ev-er, though his head for-got 
her, I am glad to say his heart did not. 

So he asked all the beasts in the sea, and all the birds in the 
air, but none of them knew the way to Shiny W all. For why ? 
He was still too far down south. 

So he swam north- ward, day after day, till at last he met 
the King of the Her-rings, with a cur-ry-comb grow-ing out of 
his nose, and a sprat in his mouth for a ci-gar, and asked him 
the way to Shiny Wall; so he bolt-ed his sprat head-fore-most, 
and said : — 

“ If I were you, young gen-tle-man, I should go to the All- 
alone-stone and ask the last of the Gair-fowl. 1 She is of a 
ver-y an-cient clan, ver-y near-ly as an-cient as my own ; and 
knows a good deal which these mod-ern up-starts don’t, as la- 
dies of old houses are like-ly to do.” 

Tom asked his way to her, and the King of the Her-rings 
told him ver-y kind-ly; for he was a cour-te-ous old gen-tle- 
man of the old school, though he was aw-ful-ly ug-ly and 
strange-ly be-decked too, like the old dan-dies who lounge in 
the club-house win-dows. 

But just as Tom had thanked him and set off, he called after 
him, “ Hi! I say, can you fly? ” 

“ I nev-er tried,” says Tom. “ Why? ” 

“ Because, if you can, I should ad- vise you to say noth-ing 
to the old la-dy about it. There, take a hint. Good-by.” 

And away Tom went for sev-en days and sev-en nights due 
north-west, till he came to a great cod-bank, the like of which 


i G air fowl: a now rare div-ing bird, whose home was in the north-ern seas. 


For Land-Babies 


81 


he nev-er saw before. The great cod lay be-low in tens of 
thou-sands, and gob-bled shell-fish all day long ; and the blue 
sharks roved a-bove in hun-dreds, and gob-bled them when 
they came up. So they ate and ate, and ate each other, as they 
had done since the ma-king of the world ; for no man had come 
here yet to catch them, and find out how rich old Moth-er Ca- 
rey is. 



AND THERE HE SAW THE LAST OF THE GAIR-FOWL, STANDING UP ON THE ALL-A-LONE-STONE, 

ALL A-LONE. 


And there he saw the last of the Gair-fowl, stand-ing up on 
the All-a-lone-stone, all a-lone. And a grand old la-dy she 
was, full three feet high, and bolt up-right, like some old 
High-land chief-tain-ess. She had on a black vel-vet gown, 
and a white pin-ner and a-pron, and a very high bridge to her 
nose (which is a sure mark of high breed-ing), and a large 


82 


Water-Babies 


pair of white spec-ta-cles on it, which made her look rath-er 
odd ; but it was the an-cient fash-ion of her house. 

Tom came up to her ver-y hum-bly, and made his bow ; and 
the first thing she said was, — 

“ Have you wings? Can you fly? ” 

“ Oh, dear, no, ma’am; I should not think of such a thing,” 
said cun-ning lit-tle Tom. 

“ Then I shall have great pleas-ure in talk-ing to you, my 
dear. It is quite re-fresh-ing now-a-days to see any-thing 
with-out wings. They must all have wings, now, ev-er-y new 
up-start sort of bird, and fly. What can they want with fly- 
ing, and rais-ing them-selves above their pro-per sta-tion in 
life ? In the days of my an-ces-tors no birds ever thought of 
hav-ing wings, and did ver-y well with-out ; and now they all 
laugh at me be-cause I keep to the good old fash-ion.” 

And so she was run-ning on, while Tom tried to get in a word 
edge-ways ; and at last he did, when the old la-dy got out of 
breath and be-gan f an-ning her-self a-gain ; and then he asked 
if she knew the way to Shiny Wall. 

“ Shiny Wall? Who should know bet-ter than I? We all 
came from Shiny Wall thou-sands of years a-go, when it was 
de-cent-ly cold, and the cli-mate was fit for gen -tie-folk; but 
now, what with the heat, and what with these vul-gar-winged 
things who fly up and down and eat ev-er-y-thing, so that gen- 
tle-people ’s hunt-ing is all spoilt, and one real-ly can-not get 
one’s liv-ing, or hard-ly ven-ture off the rock for fear of being 
flown a-gainst by some crea-ture that would not have dared to 
come within a mile of one a thou-sand years a-go — what was I 
saying ? 

“ Why, we have quite gone down in the world, my dear, and 
have noth-ing left but our hon-or. And I am the last of my 
fam-ily. A friend of mine and I came and set-tied on this 


For Land-Babies 


83 


rock when w T e were young, to be out of the way of low peo-ple. 
Once we were a great na-tion, and spread over all the North- 
ern Isles. But men shot us so, and knocked us on the head, 
and took our eggs — why, if you will be-lieve it, they say that 
on the coast of Lab-ra-dor the sail-ors used to lay a plank from 
the rock on board the thing called their ship, and drive us 
along the plank by hun-dreds, till we tum-bled down into the 
ship ’s waist in heaps ; and then, I sup-pose, they ate us, the 
nas-ty fellows ! Well — but — what was I saying? 

“ At last, there were none of us left, ex-cept on the old Gair- 
f owl-sker-ry, just off the Ice-land coast, up which no man could 
climb. Even there we had no peace ; for one day, when I was 
quite a young girl, the land rocked, and the sea boiled, and the 
sky grew dark, and all the air was filled with smoke and dust, 
and down tum-bled the old Gair-fowl-sker-ry into the sea. 
The dove-kies and mar-rocks, of course, all flew a- way; but 
we were too proud to do that. Some of us were dashed to 
pieces, and some drowned ; and those who were left got a- way 
to El-dey, and the dove-kies tell me they are all dead now, and 
that an-other Gair-fowl-sker-ry has ris-en out of the sea close 
to the old one, but that it is such a poor, flat place that it is not 
safe to live on; and so here I am left a-lone.” 

This was the Gair-f owl’s sto-ry ; and, strange as it may seem, 
it is ev-er-y word of it true. 

“ If you only had had wings,’ ’ said Tom; “ then you might 
all have flown a-way too.” 

“ Yes, young gen-tle-man; and if people are not gen-tle- 
men and la-dies, and for-get that no-blesse o-blige, 1 they will 
find it as eas-y to get on in the world as other peo-ple who don’t 
care what they do. Why, if I had not rec-ol-lec-ted that no- 


i noblesse oblige: no-bil-i-ty obliges; that is, high birth calls for high and no-Dle 
deeds. 


84 


Water-Babies 


blesse o-blige, I should not have been all a-lone now.” And 
the poor old lady sighed. 

“ How was that, ma’am? ” 

“ Why, my dear, a gen-tle-man came hith-er with me, and 
after we had been here some time, he want-ed to mar-ry — in 
fact, he pro-posed to me. Well, I can’t blame him, I was 
young, and hand-some then, I don’t de-ny ; but, you see, I could 
not hear of such a thing, be-cause he was my de-ceased sis- 
ter’s hus-band, you see? ” 

“ Of course not, ma’am,” said Tom; though, of course, he 
knew noth-ing about it. “ She was very much dis-eased, I 
sup-pose? ” 

i ‘ You do not un-der-stand me, my dear. I mean, that being 
a la-dy, and with right and hon-or-ab-le f eel-ings, as our house 
al-ways has had, I felt it my duty to snub him, and peck him, 
to keep him at his prop-er dis-tance ; and, to tell the truth, I 
once pecked him a lit-tle too hard, poor fel-low, and he tum- 
bled back- wards off the rock, and — real-ly, it was most un- 
f or-tunate, but it was not my fault — a shark com-ing by saw 
him flap-ping, and snap-ped him up. And since then I have 
lived all a-lone — 

€ With a fal-lal-la-lady / 

And soon I shall be gone, my lit-tle dear, and no-bod-y will 
miss me ; and then the poor stone will be left all a-lone.” 

“ But, please, which is the way to Shiny Wall? ” asked 
Tom. 

“ Oh, you must go, my lit-tle dear — you must go. Let me 
see — I am sure — that is — real-ly, my poor old brains are 
get-ting quite puz-zled. Do you know, my lit-tle dear, I am 
a-fraid, if you want to know, you must ask some of these vul- 
gar birds a-bout, for I have quite for-got-teu.” 


For Land-Babies 


85 


And the poor old Gair-f owl be-gan to cry tears of pure oil ; 
and Tom was quite sor-ry for her ; and for him-self too, for he 
was at his wits ’ end whom to ask. 

But by there came a flock of pet-rels, who are Moth-er Ca- 
rey ’s own chick-ens, and Tom thought them much pret-ti-er 
than La-dy Gair-f owl, and so per-haps they were ; for Moth-er 
Ca-rey had had a great deal of fresh ex-pe-ri-ence be-tween 
the time that she in-vent-ed the Gair-fowl and the time that 
she in-vent-ed them. They flit-ted along like a flock of black 
swal-lows, and hop-ped and skip-ped from wave to wave, lift- 
ing up their little feet be-hind them so dain-ti-ly, and whist- 
ling to each oth-er so ten-der-ly, that Tom fell in love with 
them at once, and called them to know the way to Shiny 
Wall. 

“ Shiny Wall? Do you want Shiny Wall? Then come 
with us, and we will show you. We are Moth-er Ca-rey *s own 
chick-ens, and she sends us out o-ver all the seas to show the 
good birds the way home.” 

Tom was de-light-ed, and swam off to themj after he had 
made his bow to the Gair-fowl. But she would not re-turn 
his bow, but held her-self bolt upright and wept tears of oil 
as she sang : — 

“ And so the poor stone was left all a-lone, 

' With a fal-lal-la-la-dy.” 

And now Tom was all a-gog to start for Shiny Wall; but 
the pet-rels said no. They must go first to All-fowls-nest, and 
wait there for the great gath-er-ing of all the sea-birds, before 
they start for their sum-mer breed-ing-places far away in the 
North-ern Isles; and there they would be sure to find some 
birds which were going to Shiny Wall; but where All-fowls- 


86 


Water-Babies 


nest was, he must prom-ise never to tell, lest men should 
go there and shoot the birds, and stuff them, and put them 
into stu-pid mu-se-ums, in-stead of leav-ing them to play and 
breed and work in Moth-er Ca-rey’s wa-ter gar-den, where 
they ought to be. 

And af-ter a while the birds be-gan to gath-er at All-fowls- 
nest in thou-sands and tens of thou-sands, black-en-ing all the 
air, — swans and brant geese, har-le-quins and ei-ders, div-ers 
and loons, gan-nets and pet-rels, with gulls and oth-er sea- 
birds be-yond nam-ing or num-ber-ing ; and they pad-died and 
washed and splashed and combed and brushed them-selves on 
the sand, till the shore was white with feath-ers; and they 
quacked and clucked and gab-bled and chat-tered and 
screamed and whooped as they talked o-ver mat-ters with their 
friends, and set-tied where they were to go and breed that 
summer, till you might have heard them ten miles off. 

Then the ' pet-rels asked this bird and that wheth-er they 
would take Tom to Shiny Wall; but one set was go-ing to 
Suth-er-land, (Scot-land), and one to the Shet-lands, and one 
to Nor-way, and one to Spitz-berg-en, and one to Ice-land, and 
one to Green-land, but none would go to Shiny Wall. So the 
good-na-tured pet-rels said that they would show him part of 
the way them-selves; but they were only going as far as Jan 
May-en’s Land , 1 and af-ter that he must shift for him-self. 

And there they fell in with a whole flock of mol-ly mocks 
who were feed-ing on a dead whale. 

‘ ‘ These are the f el-lows to show you the way,” said Moth-er 
Oa-rey’s chick-ens; “ we can-not help you far-ther north. 
We don’t like to get among the ice-pack for fear it should nip 
our toes; but the mol-lys dare fly any- where.” 

i Jan Mayen’s Land: an un-in-hab-i-ted, vol-can-ic is-land in the Arc-tic O-ce-an, 
near Green-land, first dis-covered in 1611. 


For Land-Babies 


87 


So the pet-rels called to the mol-lys ; hut they were so bus-y 
and greed-y, gob-bling and peck-ing and splut-ter-ing and 
fight-ing over the blub-ber, that they did not take the least no- 
tice. 

“ Come, come,” said the pet-rels, “ you laz-y, greed-y lub- 
bers, this young gen-tle-man is going to Moth-er Ca-rey ; and 
if you don’t at-tend on him, you won’t earn your dis-charge 
from her, you know.” 

“ Greed-y we are,” says a great fat old mol-ly, “ but laz-y 
we ain’t ; and as for lub-bers, we’re no more lub-bers than you. 
Let’s have a look at the lad.” 

And he flap-ped right into Tom’s face, and stared at him in 
the most im-pu-dent way (for the mol-lys are bold, sau-cy, fel- 
lows as all whal-ers know), and then asked him where he 
hailed from, and w r hat land he sighted last. 

And when Tom told him, he seemed pleased, and said he was 
a good plucky one to have got so far. 

“ Come a-long, lads,” he said to the rest, “ and give this lit- 
tle chap a cast over the pack for Moth-er Ca-rey ’s sake. 
We’ve eat-en blub-ber e-nough for to-day, and we’ll e’en work 
out a bit of our time by help-ing the lad. ’ ’ 

“ And where is the gate?” asked Tom. 

“ There is no gate,” said the mol-lys. 

“ No gate? ” cried Tom, a-ghast. 

“ None; nev-er a crack of one, and that’s the whole of the 
se-cret, as bet-ter fel-lows, lad, than you have found to their 
cost; and if there had been, they’d have killed by now e-ver-y 
right whale that swims the sea.” 

“ What am I to do, then? ” 

“ Dive under the ice, to be sure, if you have pluck.” 

“ I’ve not come so far to turn now,” said Tom; “ so here 
goes for a head-er.” 


88 


Water-Babies 


1 ‘ A luck-y voy-age to you, lad, ’ ’ said the mol-ly s ; “ we knew 
you were one of the right sort. So good-by.” 

“ Why don’t you come too? ” asked Tom. 

But the mol-lys only wailed sad-ly, “ We can’t go yet, we 
can’t go yet,” and flew a- way over the pack. 

So Tom dived un-der the great white gate which nev-er was 
o-pened yet, and went on in black dark-ness at the bot-tom of 
the sea, for sev-en days and sev-en nights. And yet he was 
not a bit fright-ened. Why should he be? He was a brave 
Eng-lish lad, whose bus-iness is to go ou>t and see all the 
world. 

Tom swam up to the near-est whale and asked the way to 
Moth-er Ca-rey. 

“ There she sits in the mid-dle,” said the whale. 

And when she saw Tom she looked at him kind-ly. 

“ What do you want, my lit-tle man ? It is long since I have 
seen a wa-ter ba-by here.” 

Tom told her his er-rand, and asked the way to the Oth-er- 
end-of-N o-where. 

“ You ought to know your-self, for you have been there 
al-ready.” 

“ Have I, ma’am? I’m sure I for-got all a-bout it.” 

“ Then look at me.” 

And as Tom looked into her great blue eyes he rec-ol-lec-ted 
the way per-fect-ly. 

Now, was it not strange? 

“ Thank you, ma’am,” said Tom. “ Then I won’t trou-ble 
your la-dy-ship any more; I hear you are very bus-y.” 

“ I am nev-er more bus-y than I am now,” she said, with- 
out stir-ring a fin-ger. 

“ I heard, ma’am, that you were al-ways mak-ing new beasts 
out of old.” 


For Land-Babies 


89 


“ So peo-ple fanc-y. But I am not go-ing to trou-ble my- 
self to make things, my lit-tle dear. I sit here and make them 
make them-selves. ” 

“You are a clev-er fair-y, in-deed,” thought Tom. And he 
was quite right. 

“ And now, my pret-ty lit-tle man,” said Moth-er Ca-rey, 
“ you are sure you know the way to the Oth-er-end-of-No- 
where? ” 

Tom thought ; and be-hold, he had f or-got-ten it quite. 

“ That is be-cause you took your eyes off me. ” 

Tom looked at her a-gain, and rec-ol-lec-ted ; and then looked 
a-way, and for-got in an in-stant. 

“ But what am I to do, ma’am"? for I can’t keep look-ing at 
you when I am some- where else. ’ ’ 

“You must do with-out me, as most peo-ple have to do for 
nine hun-dred and ninety-nine thou-sandths of their lives, and 
look at the dog in-stead ; for he knows the way well e-nough, 
and will not for-get it. Be-sides, you may meet some queer- 
tem-pered peo-ple there, who will not let you pass with-out 
this pass-port of mine, which you must hang round your neck 
and take care of ; and of course, as the dog will al-ways go be- 
hind you, you must go the whole way back- ward.” 

Tom was much sur-prised ; but he o-beyed her, for he had 
learnt al-ways to be-lieve what the f air-ies told him. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THE WATER-BABIES UNDERSTAND. 

Here be-gins the nev-er-to-be-too-much-stud-ied ac-count of 
the nine-hundred-and-nine-ty-ninth part of the won-der-ful 
things which Tom saw on his jour-ney to the Oth-er-end-of- 
No- where, which all good lit-tle chil-dren are re-quest-ed to 
read, that, if ever they get to the Oth-er-end-of-No- where, as 
they may very like-ly do, they may not burst out laugh-ing, or 
try to run away, or do any other sil-ly, vul-gar thing which 
may of-fend Mrs. Be-done-by-as-you-did. 

Now, as soon as Tom had left Peace-pool, he came to the 
white lap of the great sea-moth-er, ten thou-sand fath-oms 
deep ; where she makes world-pap all day long, for the steam- 
gi-ants to knead, and the fire-gi-ants to bake, till it has ris-en 
and hard-ened into moun-tain-loaves and is-land-cakes. 

And there Tom was very near being knead-ed up in the 
world-pap, and turned into a f os-sil water-baby. 

For, as he walked a-long in the si-lence of the sea-twi-light 
on the soft, white ocean floor, he was aware of a hiss-ing, and 
a roar-ing, and a thump-ing, and a pump-ing, as of all the 
steam-en-gines in the world at once. And when he came 
near, the water grew boil-ing hot, not that that hurt him in the 
least ; but it also grew as foul as gru-el ; and every mo-ment he 
stum-bled over dead shells and fish and sharks and seals and 
whales which had been killed by the hot water. 

But all of a sud-den some-bod-y shut off the steam be-low, 
90 


For Land-Babies 


91 


and the hole was left emp-ty in an in-stant; and then down 
rushed the water into the hole, in such a whirl-pool that the 
bo-gy spun round and round as fast as a tee-to-tum. But that 
was all in his day’s work, like a fair fall with the hounds; so 
all he did was to say to Tom, — 

“ Now is your time, youngster, to get down, if you are in 
earn-est, which I don’t be-lieve.” 

“ You’ll soon see,” said Tom, and away he went, as bold as 
Bar-on Mun-chau-sen, 1 and shot down the rush-ing stream, 
like a salm-on leap-ing a cat-ar-act. 

And when he got to the bot-tom, he swam till he was washed 
on shore safe upon the Oth-er-end-of-No-where; and he found 
it, to his sur-prise, as most oth-er peo-ple do, much more like 
This-end-of-Some-where than he had been in the hab-it of ex- 
pect-ing. 

After many ad-ven-tures, each more won-der-ful than the 
last, he saw be-fore him a large build-ing. 

Tom walked tow-ards this great build-ing, won-der-ing what 
it was, and hav-ing a strange fan-cy that he might find Mr. 
Grimes in-side it, till he saw run-ning tow-ard him, and shout- 
ing “ Stop! ” three or four peo-ple, who, when they came 
near-er, were noth-ing else than po-lice-men’s bat-ons or clubs 
run-ning a-long without legs or arms. 

Tom was not as-ton-ished. He was long past that. Neith- 
er was he fright-ened; for he had been do-ing no harm. 

So he stopped; and when the fore-most bat-on came up and 
asked his bus-iness, he showed Moth-er Ca-rey’s pass; and 
the bat-on looked at it in the odd-est fash-ion ; for he had one 
eye in the mid-dle of his up-per end, so that when he looked at 
any-thing, be-ing quite stiff, he had to slope him-self , and poke 

1 Munchausen: The supposed author of a book of travel filled with the most 
extravagant stories of impossible adventures. 


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Water-Babies 


him-self, till it was a won-der why he did not tum-ble over; 
but, be-ing quite full of the spir-it of jus-tice (as all po-lice- 
men and their bat-ons ought to be), he was al-ways in a posi- 
tion of sta-ble bal-anee, which-ev-er way he put him-self. 

“ All right — pass on,” said he at last. And then he 
add-ed, “ I had bet-ter go with you, young man.” And Tom 
had no ob-jec-tion, for such com-pan-y was both re-spect-a- 
ble and safe ; so the bat-on coiled its thong neat-ly round its 
han-dle, to pre-vent trip-ping it-self up, — for the thong had 
got loose in run-ning, — and marched on by Tom’s side. 

“ Why have you no po-lice-man to car-ry you? ” asked Tom 
after a while. 

‘ ‘Be-cause we are not like those clum-sy-made bat-ons in 
the land-world, which can-not go with-out hav-ing a whole 
man to car-ry them a-bout. We do our own work for our- 
selves ; and do it very well, though I say it who should not.” 

“Then, why have you a thong to your han-dle?” asked Tom. 

“To hang our-selves up by, of course, when we are off 
du-ty.” 

Tom had got his an-swer, and had no more to say till they 
came up to the great iron door of the pris-on. And there 
the bat-on knocked twice with its own head. 

A wic-ket in the door o-pened, and out looked a tre-men- 
dous old brass blun-der-buss, 1 charged up to the muz-zle with 
slugs, who was the por-ter; and Tom start-ed back a lit-tle 
at the sight of him. 

“What case is this?” he asked in a deep voice, out of his 
broad bell mouth. 

“If you please, sir, it is no case; only a young gen-tle-man 
from her lady-ship, who wants to see Grimes, the mas-ter- 
sweep.” 

1 blunderbuss: an old-fashioned gun. 


For Land-Babies 


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4 ‘Grimes?” said the blun-der-buss. And he pulled in his 
muz-zle, per-haps to look over his pris-on-lists. 

“ Grimes is up chim-ney No. 345,’ ’ he said from in-side. 
“So the young gen-tle-man had bet-ter go on to the roof.” 

Tom looked up at the e-nor-mous wall which seemed at least 
nine-ty miles high, and won-der-ed how he should ever get 
up ; but when he hinted that to the bat-on it set-tied the mat- 
ter in a mo-ment. For it whisked round, and gave him such 
a shove be-hind as sent him up to the roof in no time, with his 
lit-tle dog un-der his arm. 

And there we walked along the leads, till he met an-oth-er 
bat-on and told him his er-rand. 

“Very good,” it said. “Come a-long; but it will be of no 
use. He is the most un-re-morse-ful, hard-heart-ed, foul- 
mouthed fel-low I have in charge ; and thinks about noth-ing 
but beer and pipes, which are not al-lowed here, of course.” 

So they walked a-long over the leads ; and very soot-y they 
were, and Tom thought the chim-neys must want sweep-ing 
very much. But he was sur-prised to see that the soot did 
not stick to his feet, or dir-ty them in the least. Neith-er 
did the live coals, which were ly-ing about in plen-ty, burn 
him. 

And at last they came to chim-ney No. 345. Out of the top 
of it, his head and shoul-ders just show-ing, stuck poor Mr. 
Grimes, so soot-y and bleared and ugly, that Tom could hard- 
ly bear to look at him. And in his mouth was a pipe; but 
it was not a-light, though he was pul-ling at it with all his 
might. 

“At-ten-tion, Mr. Grimes,” said the bat-on; 4 6 here is a 
gen-tle-man come to see you.” 

But Mr. Grimes only said bad words, and kept grum-bling, 
“My pipe won’t draw. My pipe won’t draw.” 


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Water-Babies 


“Keep a civ-il tongue, and at-tend!” said the bat-on; and 
popped up just like Punch , 1 hit-ting Grimes such a crack 
over the head with it-self, that his brains rat-tied in-side like 
a dried wal-nut in its shell. He tried to get his hands out, and 
rub the place ; but he could not, for they were stuck fast in 
the chim-ney. Now he was forced to at-tend. 

“Hey!” he said, “why, it’s Tom! I sup-pose you have 
come here to laugh at me, you spite-ful lit-tle atom?” 

Tom as-sured him he had not, but only want-ed to help him. 

“I don’t want any-thing ex-cept beer, and that I can’t get; 
and a light to this both-er-ing pipe, and that I can’t get 
ei-ther.” 

“I’ll get you one,” said Tom; and he took up a live coal 
(there were plen-ty ly-ing a-bout), and put it to Grimes’s 
pipe : but it went out in-stant-ly. 

“It’s no use,” said the bat-on, lean-ing it-self up against 
the chim-ney and look-ing on. “I tell you, it is no use. His 
heart is so cold that it freezes ev-er-y-thing that comes near 
him. You will see that pres-ent-ly, plain e-nough.” 

“Oh, of course, it’s my fault. Ev-er-y-thing ’s al-ways my 
fault,” said Grimes. “Now, don’t go to hit me again” (for 
the bat-on start-ed up-right, and looked very wic-ked) ; 
“you know, if my arms were only free, you dare not hit me 
then.” 

The bat-on leaned back against the chim-ney, and took no 
no-tice of the per-son-al in-sult, like a well-trained po-lice- 
man as it was, though he was read-y e-nough to a-venge any 
trans-gres-sion a-gainst mo-ral-ity or or-der. 

“But can’t I help you in any oth-er way? Can’t I help 
you to get out of this chim-ney?” said Tom. 

“No,” in-ter-posed the bat-on; “he has come to the place 

1 Punch: the buffoon or clown of a circus or pantomime. 


For Land-Babies 


95 


where ev-er-y-body must help them-selves ; and he will find 
it out, I hope, before he has done with me.” 

“Oh, yes,” said Grimes, “of course it’s me. Did I ask to 
be brought here into the pris-on? Did I ask to be set to 
sweep your foul chim-neys ? Did I ask to have light-ed straw 
put un-der me to make me go up ? Did I ask to stick fast in 
the very first chim-ney of all, be-cause it was so shame-ful-ly 
clogged up with soot? Did I ask to stay here, — I don’t know 
how long, — a hun-dred years I do be-lieve, and nev-er get my 
pipe, nor my beer, nor noth-ing fit for a beast, let a-lone a 
man?” 

“No,” an-swered a sol-emn voice be-hind. “No more did 
Tom, when you be-haved to him in the very same way.” 

It was Mrs. Be-done-by-as-you-did. And when the bat-on 
saw her, it start-ed bolt up-right — At-ten-tion ! and made such 
a low bow, that if it had not been full of the spir-it of jus-tice, 
it must have tum-bled on its end, and prob-a-bly hurt its one 
eye. And Tom made his bow, too. 

“Oh, ma’am,” he said, “don’t think about me; that’s all 
past and gone, and good times and bad times and all times pass 
o-ver. But may not I help poor Mr. Grimes ? May not I try 
and get some of these bricks away, that he may move his 
arms?” 

“You may try, of course,” she said. 

So Tom pulled and tugged at the bricks ; but he could not 
move one. And then he tried to wipe Mr. Grimes’s face; but 
the soot would not come off. 

“Oh, dear!” he said. “I have come all this way, through 
all these ter-ri-ble pla-ces, to help you, and now I am of no 
use at all.” 

“You had best leave me a-lone,” said Grimes; “you are a 
good-na-tured, for-giv-ing lit-tle chap, and that’s truth; but 


96 


Water-Babies 


you’d best be off. The bail’s com-ing on soon, and it will beat 
the eyes out of your lit-tle head.” 

“What hail?” 

“Why, hail that falls every e-ven-ing here ; and till it conies 
close to me, it’s like so much warm rain; but then it turns to 
hail over my head, and knocks me about like small shot.” 

“That hail will never come any more,” said the strange 
la-dy. “ I have told you be-fore what it was. It was your 
moth-er’s tears, those which she shed when she prayed for 
you by her bed-side; but your cold heart froze it into hail. 
But she is gone to heav-en now, and will weep no more for her 
grace-less son.” 

Then Grimes was si-lent a while ; 'and then he looked very 
sad. 

“So my old moth-er’s gone, and I nev-er there to speak to 
her! Ah! a good wom-an she was, and might have been a 
hap-py one, in her lit-tle school there in Yen-dale, if it had not 
been for me and my bad ways.” 

“ Did she keep the school in Yen-dale? ” asked Tom. And 
then he told Grimes all the story of his going to her house, 
and how she could not a-bide the sight of a chim-ney-sweep, 
and then how kind she was, and how he turned into a wa-ter 
ba-by. 

“Ah!” said Grimes, “good rea-son she had to hate the sight 
of a chim-ney-sweep. I ran away from her and took up with 
the sweeps, and nev-er let her know where I was, nor sent her 
a pen-ny to help her, and now it’s too late — too late!” said 
Mr. Grimes. 

And he be-gan cry-ing and blub-ber-ing like a great ba-by, 
till his pipe dropped out of his mouth, and broke all to bits. 

“ Oh, dear, if I was but a little chap in Ven-dale a-gain, to 
see the clear beck , 1 and the ap-ple or-chard, and the yew-hedge, 

ibeck: a small brook or stream. 


For Land-Babies 


97 


how dif-fer-ent I would go on! But it’s too late now. So 
you go a-long, you kind little chap, and don’t stand to look 
at a man cry-ing that’s old e-nough to be your fath-er, and 
never feared the face of man, nor of worse ei-ther. But I’m 
beat now, and beat I must be. I’ve made my bed, and must 
lie on it. Foul I would be, and foul I am, as an Irish- wom-an 
said to me once ; and lit-tle I heed-ed it. It ’s all my own fault ; 
but it’s too late.” And he cried so bit-ter-ly that Tom be-gan 
cry-ing too. 

“Nev-er too late,” said the fair-y, in such a strange, soft, 
new voice that Tom looked up at her ; and she was so beau-ti- 
ful for the mo-ment, that Tom half fan-cied she was her 
sis-ter. 

No more was it too late. For, as poor Grimes cried and 
blub-ber-ed on, his own tears did what his moth-er’s could not 
do, and Tom’s could not do, and no-bod-y’s on earth could 
do for him ; for they washed the soot off his face and off his 
clothes; and then they washed the mor-tar a-way from be- 
tween the bricks, and the chim-ney crum-bled down, and 
Grimes be-gan to get out of it. 

Up jumped the bat-on, and was going to hit him on the 
crown a tre-men-dous thump, and drive him down again like 
a cork into a bot-tle. But the strange lady put it a-side. 

4 ‘Will you o-bey me if I give you a chance?” 

“As you please, ma’am. You’re strong-er than me — that 
I know too well, and wi-ser than me, I know too well also. 
And as for being my own mas-ter, I’ve fared ill e-nough with 
that as yet. So what-ev-er your la-dy-ship pleases to, or-der 
me; for I’m beat, and that’s the truth.” 

“ Be it so then — you may come out. But re-mem-ber, dis- 
o-bey me a-gain, and into a worse place still you go.” 

“I beg par-don, ma’am, but I never dis-o-beyed you that I 


98 


W ater-Babies 


know of. I nev-er had the hon-or of set-ting eyes upon you 
till I came to these ug-ly quar-ters.” 

44 Nev-er saw me? Who said to you, 4 Those that will be 
foul, foul they will be? ’ ” 

Grimes looked up, and Tom looked up too ; for the voice was 
that of the Irish-wom-an who met them the day that they 
went out to-geth-er to Harth-o-ver. 4 4 I gave you your warn- 
ing then ; but you gave it your-self a thou-sand times be-f ore 
and since. Ev-er-y bad word that you said, ev-er-y cru-el and 
mean thing that you did, ev-er-y time that you got tip-sy, 
ev-er-y day that you went dir-ty, you were dis-o-bey-ing me, 
wheth-er you knew it or not.” 

4 4 If I’d only known, ma’am” — 

4 4 You knew well e-nough that you were dis-o-bey-ing some- 
thing, though you did not know it was me. But come out and 
take your chance. Per-haps it may be your last.” 

So Grimes stepped out of the chim-ney; and real-ly, if 
it had not been for the scars on his face, he looked as clean and 
re-spect-a-ble as a mas-ter-sweep need look. 

4 4 Take him away,” said she to the bat-on , 44 and give him his 
tic-ket-of-leave. ” 1 

44 And what is he to do, ma’am?” 

4 4 Get him to sweep out the cra-ter of Et-na ; 2 he will find 
some ver-y stead-y men work-ing out their time there, who will 
teach him his bus-iness ; but mind, if that cra-ter gets choked 
a-gain, and there is an earth-quake in con-se-quence, bring 
them all to me, and I shall in-ves-ti-gate the case very se- 
ver e-ly.” 

So the bat-on marched off Mr. Grimes, look-ing as meek 
as a drowned rat. 

1 ticket-of- leave: a permit allowing a prisoner his liberty after a period of good 
behavior. 

2 Etna: a volcano in Sicily, Italy. 


For Land-Babies 


99 


And for all I know, or do not know, he is sweep-ing the 
cra-ter of Et-na to this very day. 

“ And now,” said the fair-y to Tom, “your work here is done. 
You may as well go back a-gain.” 

“I should be glad e-nough to go,” said Tom; “but how am 
I to get up that great hole a-gain, now the steam has stopped 
blow-ing?” 

“I will take you up the back-stairs; but I must band-age 
your eyes first, for I nev-er al-low any-body to see those back- 
stairs of mine.” 

So she tied the band-age on his eyes with one hand, and 
with the oth-er she took it off. 

“Now,” she said, “you are safe up the stairs.” Tom 
o-pened his eyes very wide, and his mouth too ; for he had not, 
as he thought, moved a sin-gle step. But when he looked 
round him, there could be no doubt that he was safe up the 
back-stairs, what-so-ev-er they may be, which no man is go-ing 
to tell you, for the plain rea-son that no man knows. 

The first thing which Tom saw was the black ce-dars, high 
and sharp a-gainst the ros-y dawn; and St. Bran-dan’s Isle 
re-flect-ed dou-ble in the still, broad, sil-ver sea. The wind 
sang soft-ly in the ce-dars, and the wa-ter sang a-mong the 
caves ; the sea-birds sang as they streamed out into the o-cean, 
and the land-birds as they built among the boughs ; and the air 
was so full of songs that it stirred St. Bran-dan and his her- 
mits as they slum-bered in the shade, and they moved their 
good old lips, and sang their morn-ing hymn amid their 
dreams. But a-mong all the songs one came across the wa-ter 
more sweet and clear than all ; for it was the song of a young 
girl’s voice. 

And what was the song which she sang? Ah, my lit-tle 
man, I am too old to sing that song, and you too young to un- 


100 


Water-Babies 


der-stand it. But have pa-tience, and keep your eye sin-gle, 
and your hands clean, and you will learn some day to sing it 
your-self, without need-ing any man to teach you. 

As Tom neared the is-land, there sat up-on a rock, the 
most grace-ful crea-ture that ev-er was seen, look-ing down, 
with her chin upon her hand, and pad-dling with her feet in 



THERE SAT UP-ON A ROCK, THE MOST GRACE-FUL CREA-TURE THAT EV-ER WAS SEEN. 


the wa-ter. And when they came to her she looked up, and 
be-hold it was El-lie. 

“O Miss El-lie,” said he, “how you are grown!” 

“ O Tom, ’ ’ said she, ‘ ‘ how you are grown too ! ” 

And no won-der ; they were both quite grown up — he in-to 
a tall man, and she into a beau-ti-ful wom-an. 

“Per-haps I may be grown,” she said. “I have had time 


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e-nough ; for I have been sit-ting here wait-ing for you ma-ny 
a hun-dred years, till I thought you were nev-er com-ing.” 

1 6 Many a hun-dred years'?” thought Tom; but he had seen 
so much in his trav-els that he had quite giv-en up being as- 
ton-ished ; and, in-deed, he could think of noth-ing but El-lie. 
So he stood and looked at El-lie, and El-lie looked at him: and 
they liked the em-ploy-ment so much that they stood and 
looked for sev-en years more, and neith-er spoke nor stir-red. 

At last they heard the fair-y say, “At-ten-tion, chil-dren. 
Are you never go-ing to look at me a-gain?” 

“We have been look-ing at you all this while,” they said. 
And so they thought they had been. 

“Then look at me once more,” said she. 

They looked — and both of them cried out at once, “Oh, who 
are you, af-ter all?” 

“You are our dear Mrs. Do-as-you-would-be-done-bv. ” 

“No, you are good Mrs. Be-done-by-as-you-did ; but you are 
grown quite beau-ti-ful now!” 

“To you,” said the fairy. “But look again.” 

“You are Mo-ther Ca-rey,” said Tom, in a very low, sol-emn 
voice ; for he had found out some-thing which made him very 
hap-py, and yet fright-ened him more than all that he had 
ev-er seen. 

“But you are grown quite young a-gain.” 

“To you,” said the fairy. “But look a-gain.” 

“You are the Irish- wom-an who met me the day I went to 
Harth-o-ver ! ” 

And when they looked she was neith-er of them, and yet all 
of them at once. 

“My name is writ-ten in my eyes, if you have eyes to see it 
there.” 

And they looked into her great, deep, soft eyes, and they 


102 


Water-Babies 


changed a-gain and a-gain into every hue, as the light chan-ges 
in a di-a-mond. 

“Now read my name/’ she said at last. 

And her eyes flashed, for one mo-ment, clear, white, blaz-ing 
light ; but the chil-dren could not read her name ; for they were 
daz-zled, and hid their faces in their hands. 

“Not yet, young things, not yet,” said she, smil-ing; and 
then she turned to Ellie. 

“You may take him home with you now on Sun-days, El-lie. 
He has won his spurs in the great bat-tie, and be-come fit to 
go with you and be a man ; be-cause he has done the thing he 
did not like.” 

So Tom went home with El-lie on Sun-days, and some-times 
on week-days too ; and he is now a great man of sci-ence, and 
can do many things. And all this from what he learnt when 
he was a water-baby un-der-neath the sea. And that is the 
end of my story. 

MOR-AL. 

And now , my dear lit-tle man , what should we learn from 
this par-a-ble? 

We should learn thir-ty-seven or thir-ty-nine things , I am 
not ex-act-ly sure which ; but one thing, at least , we may learn , 
and that is this — when we see efts in the pond, never to throw 
stones at them, or catch them with crook-ed pins, or put them 
into vi-va-ri-ums 1 with stic-kle-backs, that the stic-kle-backs 
way prick them in their poor little stom-achs, and make them 
jump out of the glass into some-bod-y y s work-box, and so come 
to a bad end . For these efts are noth-ing else but the wa-ter 
ba-bies who are stu-pid and dir-ty, and will not learn their les- 
sons and keep them-selves clean; and, there-fore their skulls 

1 Vivariums: aquariums, or hot-houses, where living things are reared. 


For Land-Babies 


103 


grow flat, their jaws grow out, and their brains grow small, 
and their tails grow long, and they lose all their ribs ( which 
I am sure you would not like to do), and their skins grow 
dir-ty and spot-ted, and they nev-er get into the clear riv-ers, 
much less into the great wide sea, but hang about in dir-ty 
ponds, and live in the mud, and eat worms, as they de-serve 
to do. 

But that is no rea-son why you should ill-use them, but only 
why you should pity them, and be kind to them, and hope 
that some day they will ivake up and be a-shamed of their 
nas-ty, dir-ty, la-zy, stu-pid life, and try to a-mend and be- 
come some-thing bet-ter once more. For, per-haps, if they 
do so, then after 379,423 years, nine months, thir-teen days, 
two hours, and twen-ty-one min-utes ( for all that ap-pears 
to the con-tra-ry) , if they work very hard and wash very hard 
all that time, their brains may groiv big-ger, and their jaws 
grow smaller, and their ribs come back, and their tails wither 
off, and they will turn into water-babies again, and per-haps 
after that into land-babies; and after that per-haps into grown 
men. 

You know they won't ? Very well, I daresay you knoiv 
best. But you see, some folks have a great lik-ing for those 
poor little efts. They nev-er did any-body any harm, or coidd 
if they tried; and their only faidt is, that they do no good 
— any more than some thousands of their bet-ters. But what 
with ducks, and what with pike, and what with stic-kle-backs, 
and what with water-bee-tles, and what with naugh-ty boys, 
they are “ sae sair had-den doun ," 1 as the Scots-men say, that 
it is a wonder how they live; and some folks can't help hop-ing, 
with good Bish-op But-ler, that they may have an-other chance 


i sae sair hadden doun: so sore holden down. 


104 


Water-Babies 


to make things fair and even , some-where , some-tvhen, some- 
how . 

Mean-while , do you learn your lessons , and thank God that 
you have plen-ty of cold water to wash in; and wash in it too , 
like a true Eng-lish-man . And then , if my sto-ry is not true , 
some-thing bet-ter is; and if I am not quite right, still you will 
be, as long as you stick to hard work and cold water. 

But re-mem-ber always, as I told you at first, that this is 
all a fair-y tale, and only fun and pre-tence; and, ther e-fore, 
you are not to be-lieve a word of it, even if it is true . 


















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